Chinook Regional Hospital emergency room gets $9 million facelift

A major renovation at Chinook Regional Hospital in Lethbridge will see an  increase in space and improvements to patient privacy in the emergency department. The $9-million renovation project began earlier this week and will extend over a period of 40 months. The project is expected to be complete in 2017.

“The reason the emergency project is going to take so long is we’re trying to limit the impact to patients,” says Teri Myhre, Vice President of Acute Care West, Alberta Health Services (AHS) South Zone. “We can’t close our emergency department – that’s just not realistic. Instead, we’ve broken the project into five smaller phases so we can continue to function and care for patients.”

The first phase of the renovation will be in some patient and office areas.  Prior to the launch of the project, some regular emergency department services were moved. A new waiting room and triage area is being constructed in an area previously occupied by the respiratory department, which has moved to another part of the hospital. This new waiting room will be located near current waiting area. It is scheduled to be complete in April.

The project will increase the current emergency department space by at least a third. It will add patient space, divide waiting areas into two and create dedicated private rooms for gynecology treatment, trauma, psychiatry services, and improved infection prevention and control.

“We expect our wait times to see a physician will increase at times during this project,” says Dr. Peter Kwan, Chief of Emergency at Chinook Regional Hospital. “It’s one of the reasons we want to urge those in our community to use the emergency department wisely.This is going to be especially important during construction because there will be times when that work might temporarily reduce the size of our treatment areas. We’re going to do the best we can and we’re simply asking the community to consider other options besides the emergency department for care when appropriate.”

The Emergency Department renovation is part of the $128-million capital redevelopment project funded by the Government of Alberta. The overall project includes construction of a new 19,000-square-metre wing that will expand acute and ambulatory care, outpatient clinics, respiratory therapy, pre-operative assessment, and labour and delivery.

Individuals can call Health Link Alberta at 1-866-408-5465 to determine if the emergency department is the place to seek care for their health concerns.

AHS encourages Albertans to consider other options, such as primary care clinics, pharmacies, and Health Link Alberta, before visiting an emergency department.