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LEBANON, NH (WCAX) – Construction is moving forward on the new 200,000-square-foot patient pavilion at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. Like other recent expansion projects, it’s designed to get people the care they need in the right place, officials said.
Dartmouth Health is in the midst of a major expansion at its main campus in Lebanon. It’s a $150 million project that officials say will reduce health care costs in the long run.
“We are relatively small in terms of the size of the community we serve,” said Dr. Joanne Conroy, CEO of Dartmouth Health.
The nation’s rural academic medical center is growing to meet that community need. One way is a new 64-room patient pavilion that will, among other things, provide care for cardiovascular patients.
Every month, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center turns away hundreds of patients because they don’t have a room.
“Currently, we remove 500 high-acuity referrals,” Conroy said.
Another expansion project just completed included additional beds for the facility’s emergency room for psychiatric patients, which officials said was exacerbated during the outbreak.
“The outbreak has really created a crisis and made it more obvious,” said Susan Reeves, executive vice president of Dartmouth Health. “Trying to separate mental health from other types of health is really impossible.”
The importance of mental health beds for long-term patients is also great. At any given time in New Hampshire alone, dozens of mental health patients are waiting in emergency rooms to find a bed more suitable for the care they need.
“Unfortunately, there aren’t enough services to meet the need, and as a result, people often rush to emergency departments for those issues,” says Dr. Christine Finn, director of emergency psychiatric services.
The new large emergency room for group therapy spaces addresses the needs of patients who may be admitted there.
“Our society must turn to mental health and substance use in the same way and with the same weight of purpose that we turn to other health conditions,” said Dr. William Torre, interim chair of the Department of Psychiatry.
Everything is connected – just like the construction. The projects aim to make the hospital more efficient with specialized care. Officials say this is due to the ability to move patients to the beds they need when they need them.
“It’s getting them out of a high-risk, high-cost position and into a position where they can recover quickly. That’s how you really control the cost of care,” Conroy said.
Along with the new beds, the tent is expected to create hundreds of new jobs. In the year It will begin accepting patients in the spring of 2023.
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