Children’s Health Foundation president and CEO Scott Fortnum calls it an “aggressive timeline” but says a $3-million expansion will nearly double the capacity of the emergency department at Children’s Hospital at London Health Sciences Centre by June.
Fortnum says the hospital, one of just four dedicated children’s hospitals in Ontario and one of 13 in Canada, has the smallest emergency department despite being “the third- or fourth-largest, depending on how you measure it.”
“We are grossly under capacity to meet the needs of our community. So this has been a long time coming.”
The expansion will see the creation of eight more beds in the emergency department as well as two treatment rooms to help support an increase in patients requiring mental health care.
“We’ll have more dedicated space, more appropriate space for those treatments, for those kids who come in. They’re coming in younger and younger and it’s sadly an area of increased demand.”
Children’s Health Foundation exists “almost exclusively” to fund the needs of the hospital, including programs and equipment, but the emergency department expansion was specifically requested, Fortnum said, adding that there was “an opportunity with some space.”
Currently, Fortnum said the Children’s Hospital is at 203 per cent “more patients than we are designed to look after here.”
Children’s Hospital president Nash Syed said in a release that the hospital “continues to see an increasing demand for its specialized health care supports and services as patient needs increase across our region,” which is “one of Canada’s fastest-growing cities.”
Construction is expected to start in January and be complete by June.