Guelph General Hospital to add more space to deal with anticipated surge of patients
Hospital installing a temporary structure outside emergency department
To deal with an anticipated surge of patients due to COVID-19 and the flu this fall, Guelph General Hospital (GGH) plans to add more space to its emergency department.
"The goal is to provide additional space to achieve the new standards required due to COVID-19, something which is paramount to the safety of both patients and staff," GGH said in a release.
That will require staff to design the space to maintain physical distancing measures and to create negative-pressure, resuscitation rooms.
"In order to achieve these standards, we will be commencing a series of interrelated renovation projects," the hospital said.
That includes renovations to the emergency department X-ray room, which is currently underway, to convert it into a new negative-pressure trauma and resuscitation room for patients who are suspected to be, or positive for, COVID-19, the release said.
The hospital will also be installing a large, temporary structure in the parking area outside the department, which will act as the public's entry point for the emergency department. It will include the registration, triage and the main waiting room.
The temporary structure is expected to arrive the first week of November and will take roughly two weeks to connect with GGH's infrastructure such as water, hydro and computer system.
Once that structure is in place and being used, the current waiting room, triage and registration areas within the emergency department will be modified, the hospital said.
Code Orange
The emergency department was sized to handle a volume of 45,000 visits a year, which has increased to 60,000 visits over the past six years, according to the release.
A Code Orange was declared at the hospital on Sept. 23 when 17 patients were in the emergency department waiting to be admitted.
"This is rarely called and it is activated when we know we cannot continue to take patients for admission and we need help from others," Perry Hagerman, communications specialist with the hospital, said in an email to CBC News.
The Code Orange ended at 6:30 p.m. that day.
The hospital said it's also planning to permanently expand the emergency department by building out from the hospital. That project is currently awaiting approval from the province.