Central Valley Medical Center  

unveils $23M upgrade

 

By Kristi Shields

Staff writer

7-9-2020

 

NEPHI—Central Valley Medical Center in Nephi is ready to show off its new hospital renovation that will bring the best possible healthcare to rural Utahns.

The two-year and $23 million upgrade and expansion includes a brand-new Emergency Room, the addition of a second-floor Women’s Center, Physical Therapy and Orthopedic space, a newly renovated cafeteria and laundry area and a completely new MRI area.

The ribbon cutting will be on July 14 at 10 a.m.—the same day the ER opens. The Women’s Center will open on July 15. CVMC is also hosting a virtual open house on its website, but the idea is still in the works and a date is not set; it will most likely be around the same time as the ribbon cutting.

CVMC first opened in January 2000, and since then, the hospital has undergone four minor renovations, this renovation being the fifth and largest one, which included renovations of 66,000 square feet of the original 63,418 square foot hospital.

“[We have] a lot of growth coming to Nephi,” said Chief Operating Officer Randy Cuff. “We’re really excited; we’ve been working on this project for a long time, been putting a lot of work into this. It’s neat to have a facility like this in a rural community.”

The Women’s Center

The new Women’s Center is on the top floor and will be a restricted area, as opposed to before where the Women’s Center was in the middle of the hospital. This is for safety purposes and noise control.

The construction workers will also be installing a system in the elevator to make it an employee only elevator. The reason for this is to keep the new moms and babies safe and to give them privacy.

The new Women’s Center has four large labor and delivery rooms, three postoperative rooms, a nursery area, and an operating room solely for mothers who are having C-sections.

“I don’t think you’ll find a larger labor and delivery room,” Cuff said.

Cuff said the hospital currently delivers 12-13 babies per month; with the expansion, they hope to deliver 20 babies per month.

Radiology

The previous MRI room was in a trailer outside the back of the hospital. The new MRI room is now inside the building in the radiology department.

“This is very convenient, and we can increase [the number of] MRI’s we do,” Cuff said.

The upgraded MRI machine allows for more MRI’s to take place and gives faster results.

ER Manager Jared England said, “To appreciate this, you have to see where we were originally.”

Originally, the hospital could do seven MRI’s at the most, and now they can do 12-14. The speed of results is now seven minutes rather than the 30-40 minutes it normally took.

“Every second counts,” MRI Director Karson Morgan said. “It saves a lot of time and can save patients.”

Emergency Room

The ER now has three trauma bays and five exam rooms, whereas before the ER had two trauma bays and three exam rooms.

England said, “It will give us a lot more room and also a lot more functionality.”

The expansion also included more space for the doctors’ offices, so the doctors can be located in their own departments.

The cafeteria

The newly renovated cafeteria is four times the size of the old cafeteria.

Chef Austin Buhler said the cooks received upgraded appliances, including a high tech oven that turns into a smoker grill and has a computer that tracks what it’s cooking.

“It does more than even I know it does at the moment,” Buhler said. “They treated me and my team very well, spoiled us well.”

The laundry area

The laundry area also has much more space than it did before.

Employees said space is the best part of the renovation.

Next Renovation

As soon as the new ER opens, Westland Construction will start on the expansion of the same-day surgery bays where the current ER is located. Instead of the bays being divided with curtains, the eight bays will be private rooms.

The same-day surgery expansion is expected to take six to nine months.

President and Chief Executive Officer Mark Stoddard said: “I’m grateful for all the work that’s gone in from our construction group, Westland. They’re building a fantastic facility, and I look forward to serving our community for many years to come.”