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Gonzales Outpatient Center Opens *** St. Elizabeth Facility the First of Its Kind in Ascension Parish

Posted on: Thursday, 30 March 2006, 18:00 CST

By DARLENE DENSTORFF

Gonzales outpatient center opens *** St. Elizabeth facility the first of its kind in Ascension Parish

GONZALES - The doors of St. Elizabeth Hospital's new outpatient surgery center opened to the public March 23 after the facility was blessed by the Most Rev. Robert Muench, bishop of Baton Rouge.

The new Ambulatory Surgery Center, on the second floor in the medical office building behind the hospital, will enable doctors to perform laparoscopy, lithotripsy, endoscopy and other outpatient surgeries in three operating rooms.

More than 100 hospitals workers, doctors, elected officials and area residents attended the dedication ceremony under a big tent adjacent to the St. Elizabeth Hospital Health Park Medical Office Building.

Jim Prince, chairman of the board of directors of the Franciscan Mission of Our Lady Health System, said the new addition will enable the hospital to continue the mission the Franciscan nuns started in 1913. That mission: providing health care in Louisiana.

Prince called St. Elizabeth Hospital "one of the bright and shining jewels in the crown" of the health system, which includes hospitals in Lafayette, Baton Rouge, Monroe and Gonzales.

St. Elizabeth Hospital board Chairman Hickley Waguespack spoke about other additions planned this year. They include a ground breaking scheduled in May on a new office building in Prairieville and construction to start later this year on a hospital expansion.

"We have become a leader within the system because of the people we have," Waguespack said.

After the brief ceremony, visitors got a chance to tour the new facility, expected to open April 10.

"Get ready, here they come," Jill Lee, director of surgical services for the hospital, said as the guests started lining up for tours.

Lee noted that some of the equipment had not arrived for the operating rooms. The facility also includes two endoscope suites, a pain management room and 15 pre- and post-operative bays.

The new 10,000-square-foot center is the first of its kind in Ascension Parish, Lee said.

"Everything about this facility was designed to convey the feeling of home," Lee said. "Besides the homelike atmosphere, the advantage to an ambulatory surgery center is the time savings patients realize. Patients can be discharged much more quickly than in a traditional hospital setting."

The center will provide orthopedic; ear, nose and throat; gynecological and urological surgery; and endoscopies.

Lee said the center is projected to complete nearly 2,000 procedures each year.

Lee said the hospital's preadmittance procedures will save time for patients on surgery day. The center will be staffed with 14 nurses and technicians.

The hospital was purchased by Our Lady of the Lake in 2000 and came directly under the Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System in 2004.

Source: Advocate; Baton Rouge, La.

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