Post by emsguru on Aug 15, 2009 10:21:35 GMT -4
An article posted in the capital today.
State's second free-standing ER to debut in 2010
UMMS building will be Queen Anne's first ER
By SHANTEE WOODARDS, Staff Writer
Published 08/15/09
Queen Anne's County is expected to get its first emergency room next year.
University of Maryland Medical System is at the beginning phase of erecting a 24-hour free-standing emergency center. For years, Queen Anne's County residents have been without a hospital, forcing them to go to other areas for emergency medical care. That proved problematic, since ambulances would have to face Bay Bridge traffic to reach Anne Arundel Medical Center, or go to other hospitals in Talbot or Kent counties.
Once it opens, the facility will be the second free-standing emergency room in the state. The first, Shady Grove Adventist Emergency Center, is in Germantown, Montgomery County.
Problems were eased last year when AAMC opened an urgent care facility on Kent Island. However, officials said there was still a need for a 24-hour facility to assist residents with medical emergencies.
"As far as creating a public health network for our county, this is the best thing," Queen Anne's County Commissioner Gene Ransom, D-Grasonville, said. "This will have a big economic development effect. There will be probably be 250 new jobs for Queen Anne's County, not counting the construction workers and things like that."
In 2007, UMMS announced plans to create a free-standing emergency room in Queen Anne's County, which is one of two counties in the state lacking a hospital (the other is Caroline County). At that time, state Sen. E.J. Pipkin, R-Elkton, sponsored a bill that would make it easier for UMMS to build the facility in the county. The bill passed.
The Queen Anne's County Emergency Care Center is expected to open in 2010. The 16,000-square-foot facility will be located on a 15-acre parcel of land on Nesbit Road in Grasonville. A groundbreaking ceremony is being held on Monday.
UMMS launched its plans for the center about a year after AAMC started construction on its urgent care facility, AAMC Health Services - Kent Island. The $10 million building opened in 2008 and offers extended night and weekend hours. It provides primary care and urgent care, but patients with emergency medical needs are still sent to hospitals in the region.
The new emergency center will cost Queen Anne's County officials $5 million and UMMS somewhere between $15 million and $18 million. Under the arrangement, UMMS will operate the facility as an emergency center for at least three years. If that is unsuccessful, the land would revert to the county.
The center will have 11 treatment rooms along with on-site diagnostic imaging and laboratory services. Shore Health System, which is part of UMMS, will staff and operate the building. Baltimore Washington Medical Center, the other hospital in Anne Arundel County, is also part of UMMS.
Because it is not a hospital, the newer facility will be unable to take overnight patients. It will only be able to take patients identified by paramedics as priority three or priority four, which are basically minor injuries. For example, patients having a heart attack would be taken to a hospital because they may need procedures or intense care over the course of several days. But someone who feels ill or has a broken bone would be taken to the emergency center.
"What this tells you is that you better have good people in the field to be able to draw some conclusions about what the patient needs. It puts a lot of pressure on the ambulance crew," said Dr. Eric Wargotz, Queen Anne's commissioner at large. "It is my hope and belief, and the hope of a majority of the commission, that eventually someone shows an interest in building an inpatient facility - a hospital or a medical center in the county somewhere."
The new center also will greatly reduce ambulance travel times. Now, paramedics who pick up a patient in Centreville and head to a hospital in Chestertown or Easton are unable to respond to the next call for about an hour and a half, said John Chew, Queen Anne's director of emergency services. If the ambulance has to battle backed-up Bay Bridge traffic to go to AAMC, that can take two and a half hours round-trip, he added. But a paramedic traveling to the new emergency facility could have a turnaround time of 10 to 15 minutes, he said.
"More than 50 percent of all our transports in the county are priority fours and threes. ... Sometimes it's as high as 70 percent," Chew said. "(With the emergency center), we'll be back in service (quickly) and we won't have as many units out of service at one time."
State's second free-standing ER to debut in 2010
UMMS building will be Queen Anne's first ER
By SHANTEE WOODARDS, Staff Writer
Published 08/15/09
Queen Anne's County is expected to get its first emergency room next year.
University of Maryland Medical System is at the beginning phase of erecting a 24-hour free-standing emergency center. For years, Queen Anne's County residents have been without a hospital, forcing them to go to other areas for emergency medical care. That proved problematic, since ambulances would have to face Bay Bridge traffic to reach Anne Arundel Medical Center, or go to other hospitals in Talbot or Kent counties.
Once it opens, the facility will be the second free-standing emergency room in the state. The first, Shady Grove Adventist Emergency Center, is in Germantown, Montgomery County.
Problems were eased last year when AAMC opened an urgent care facility on Kent Island. However, officials said there was still a need for a 24-hour facility to assist residents with medical emergencies.
"As far as creating a public health network for our county, this is the best thing," Queen Anne's County Commissioner Gene Ransom, D-Grasonville, said. "This will have a big economic development effect. There will be probably be 250 new jobs for Queen Anne's County, not counting the construction workers and things like that."
In 2007, UMMS announced plans to create a free-standing emergency room in Queen Anne's County, which is one of two counties in the state lacking a hospital (the other is Caroline County). At that time, state Sen. E.J. Pipkin, R-Elkton, sponsored a bill that would make it easier for UMMS to build the facility in the county. The bill passed.
The Queen Anne's County Emergency Care Center is expected to open in 2010. The 16,000-square-foot facility will be located on a 15-acre parcel of land on Nesbit Road in Grasonville. A groundbreaking ceremony is being held on Monday.
UMMS launched its plans for the center about a year after AAMC started construction on its urgent care facility, AAMC Health Services - Kent Island. The $10 million building opened in 2008 and offers extended night and weekend hours. It provides primary care and urgent care, but patients with emergency medical needs are still sent to hospitals in the region.
The new emergency center will cost Queen Anne's County officials $5 million and UMMS somewhere between $15 million and $18 million. Under the arrangement, UMMS will operate the facility as an emergency center for at least three years. If that is unsuccessful, the land would revert to the county.
The center will have 11 treatment rooms along with on-site diagnostic imaging and laboratory services. Shore Health System, which is part of UMMS, will staff and operate the building. Baltimore Washington Medical Center, the other hospital in Anne Arundel County, is also part of UMMS.
Because it is not a hospital, the newer facility will be unable to take overnight patients. It will only be able to take patients identified by paramedics as priority three or priority four, which are basically minor injuries. For example, patients having a heart attack would be taken to a hospital because they may need procedures or intense care over the course of several days. But someone who feels ill or has a broken bone would be taken to the emergency center.
"What this tells you is that you better have good people in the field to be able to draw some conclusions about what the patient needs. It puts a lot of pressure on the ambulance crew," said Dr. Eric Wargotz, Queen Anne's commissioner at large. "It is my hope and belief, and the hope of a majority of the commission, that eventually someone shows an interest in building an inpatient facility - a hospital or a medical center in the county somewhere."
The new center also will greatly reduce ambulance travel times. Now, paramedics who pick up a patient in Centreville and head to a hospital in Chestertown or Easton are unable to respond to the next call for about an hour and a half, said John Chew, Queen Anne's director of emergency services. If the ambulance has to battle backed-up Bay Bridge traffic to go to AAMC, that can take two and a half hours round-trip, he added. But a paramedic traveling to the new emergency facility could have a turnaround time of 10 to 15 minutes, he said.
"More than 50 percent of all our transports in the county are priority fours and threes. ... Sometimes it's as high as 70 percent," Chew said. "(With the emergency center), we'll be back in service (quickly) and we won't have as many units out of service at one time."