UPMC East Previews July Opening

May 31, 2012 9:13 PM

(Credit: KDKA)

Reporting Jon Delano

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PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — UPMC East is this region’s newest full-service hospital scheduled to open in Monroeville on July 2nd.

“This truly is a state-of the art facility,” says UPMC East President Mark Sevco.

When UPMC closed its Braddock hospital, its focus was on building this new 156-bed facility to serve the health needs of suburban communities east of Pittsburgh.

And UPMC officials say it will be different — like having 22 emergency bays for patient medical emergencies.

“Welcome to the emergency department,” says Timothy VanFleet, chief of emergency medicine. “This is the waiting area, but we’re not calling it the waiting area because we don’t expect patients to wait.”

UPMC East says it wants to minimize waiting in the ER — in part, by doing lab work right near the ER.

“Most of our lab tests will be resulted in 15 to 20 minutes whereas in the average emergency department it’s an hour to an hour and a half,” adds VanFleet.

Again, to reduce patient wait time, imaging like CT scans and MRI’s are conducted nearby.

“We usually can do four to five patient visits an hour on this, very quick turnaround time,” says Sevco.

The hospital claims the latest in equipment for its seven operating rooms and when a patient is transferred to a room, UPMC East claims a difference.

“All rooms are private, they have hotel-like amenities compared to a hospital,” adds Jeffrey Alvarez, RN Director.

The hospital employs over 400 people who are already in training for opening day.

“This is going to be a place where medicine is done differently and I think everybody will feel that — the physicians will feel it, the patients certainly will feel it,” notes Timothy Gaul, vice president of medical affairs.