Saanich Peninsula residents will have a full hospital with improved surgical capacity following Thursday’s announcement of a $9.5-million upgrade.
The improvements will see the construction of a new operating suite, with three operating rooms, scheduled to open by 2012, and upgrades to other areas including the hospital’s electrical systems. Tenders for the work are expected to go out early next year.
"It’s just a plus-plus for the Peninsula," said Central Saanich Mayor Jack Mar, whose municipality hosts the hospital on Mount Newton Cross Road.
Saanich Peninsula Hospital is "so close; it’s just down the road from us. It’s almost in the centre of the community," said Mar. "I know so many people who say ‘I love our little hospital, if anything happens it’s just five minutes away.’ "
The hospital opened in 1978 and is now a 48-bed community facility with two operating rooms and a smaller room that functions primarily as a labour and delivery room.
The redevelopment will add new equipment, 690 square metres of space making possible the third operating room, and an integrated procedures room for endoscopies and other minor procedures.
Funding for the upgrade came from: provincial government, $2.6 million; the municipal Capital Regional Hospital District, $1.8 million; the Vancouver Island Health Authority, $124,000; and the citizen-led Saanich Peninsula Hospital Foundation, $5 million.
Karen Morgan, executive director of the Saanich Peninsula Hospital Foundation, said donations came from the estimated 40,000 people living in the facility’s catchment area, from Broadmead in Saanich all the way up the Peninsula to Sidney.
The money was raised in only three years, demonstrating just how important the hospital is to local residents, Morgan said.
"The community feels a very strong sense of ownership," she said.
"When they come into emergency or other areas of the hospital, they already know some of the staff. It gives people a sense of comfort that they are coming to a place where they know people and are known."
As a community hospital, Saanich Peninsula performs simpler procedures than can be undertaken at Royal Jubilee and Victoria General. But those procedures are key to meeting demands on the VIHA system.
Procedures considered core at Saanich Peninsula are in gynecology, general surgery, orthopedics, urology, dental surgery and ear, nose and throat.
Morgan noted that a hospital has existed on the Peninsula since just after the First World War. An extended-care facility opened in 1974, providing advanced nursing care. After much lobbying and effort, the acute-care capacity was added.
"Having fought so hard to get the hospital, people feel a strong sense that this is theirs," Morgan said.
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