Some areas inside Schneck Medical Center will look different in the near future due to construction that’s underway.
Inside the Seymour hospital’s main entrance used to be the outpatient care center, a waiting room for laboratory draws, a pain center and an endoscopy waiting area.
During a recent hospital board of trustees meeting, Debbie Mann, vice president of finance and chief financial officer, said since the pain center relocated to the new Schneck Professional Building, that provided a lot of space that could be reallocated.
"Right now, we’re doing a project where we’re using that space to create three new procedure rooms, so we’ll be able to do some lighter surgery cases in those rooms," Mann said.
To start out, they will target cataract surgeries and pain management cases in that space rather than doing those procedures in the current operating suites, she said.
"Currently, if someone’s coming in to have surgery, we do a preadmission testing appointment, and so those appointments are now done on the second floor," she said. "We’ve renovated an area and moved those individuals to the second floor."
The lobby that led to the endoscopy waiting area will become a waiting room for the new outpatient center, where patients go for lab draws and outpatient procedures.
"What this also does for us is it allows us to go up to the second floor where surgical suite areas are and we currently have an operating room that’s a little bit smaller than we would like for it to be, so this will allow us to expand OR Suite No. 1 to make a larger space and then also create another new larger operating room that we can use for some of our more involved cases," Mann said.
That could include orthopedic and neurosurgery cases.
"The project also allows us to better utilize our OR space," Mann said.
Also, in the Jackson Medical Building, Schneck Pulmonology is being moved to provide better access for patients.
Last year, a St. Vincent cardiology practice moved from the east side of the first floor to the third floor.
The vacant office is now being renovated to move Schneck Pulmonology from the far east side of the second floor to the first floor.
"That practice is as far away from the elevators and the door as any practice, so that hadn’t been a good location for them, obviously the nature of their pulmonology patients making that long walk," Mann said.
"Then as that practice continues to grow, they were really in need of more space, so bringing them down to the first floor will allow us to expand that office into five exam rooms, and we’ll also be moving the entryway a little bit closer to the front entrance," she said.
That also will position Schneck well for when it decides to connect the Jackson Medical Building with the new parking garage.
"That’s not a project that we’re ready to do, but at the point that we are ready, that pulmonology office was in space that we would need to utilize, so it helps us accomplish several goals by moving that practice down to the first floor," Mann said.