By GREGORY ZELLER //
A bustling Long Island hospital has completed the second phase of a $50 million Emergency Department expansion – just part of a larger $400 million strategic-growth initiative.
Oceanside-based Mount Sinai South Nassau hospital, Long Island flagship of the New York City-based Mount Sinai Health System, has ceremoniously cut the ribbon on its new eight-bed Trauma Unit, officially wrapping up the second phase of its multiyear renovation effort.
The ED expansion, which kicked off in 2016, is broken into five phases and will ultimately increase the Emergency Department’s capacity from 35,000 annual emergency-patient visits – space in which the strapped hospital, in some years, has treated more than 60,000 annual patients – to capacity for roughly 80,000 annual emergency-patient visits.
The $5 million second phase introduces the new Trauma Unit, which has been dubbed “ED Central” and includes three large emergency-care bays, providing plenty of elbow room for hustling trauma team members. Stocked with next-generation imaging systems and other cutting-edge technologies, the spacious bays can also be quickly divided into six separate treatment areas “in the event of a mass-casualty incident,” according to the hospital.
ED Central also features eight private patient-treatment rooms – including two for pediatric patients – and a “negative pressure room” to treat patients with contagious airborne diseases.
Jay Itkowitz: Significant progress.
The opening of the new Trauma Unit marks “another significant step in our mission … to remain the region’s leading provider of emergency medical care,” according to Jay Itkowitz, chairman of Mount Sinai South Nassau’s Department of Emergency Medicine.
“When the expansion is completed, our neighboring communities will have an Emergency Department and a Trauma Center that will provide a more streamlined and efficient flow of care, improving outcomes and patient experience,” Itkowitz added.
The completion of Phase 2 comes nearly six years after the completion of Phase 1, which wrapped up in 2017, before then-South Nassau Communities Hospital merged with the Mount Sinai Health System.
The $4.5 million Phase 1 included a 16-bed Emergency Department extension that aimed to reduce wait times and keep services flowing while the Oceanside hospital tackled other renovations.
The Emergency Department expansion is the cornerstone of the hospital’s $130 million “J Wing” construction effort, itself part of a larger $400 million construction plan.
Cut to cure: Hospital officials open Mount Sinai South Nassau’s new Trauma Unit.
The new wing, which adds four floors and 100,000 square feet, is now slated to be completed in 2025 – planners originally targeted 2023 – and projected to also house expanded Intensive Care and Critical Care units, as well as nine new operating theaters outfitted with the latest surgical technologies.
Mount Sinai South Nassau Board of Directors Co-chairman Anthony Cancellieri called the opening of the new Trauma Unit “yet another milestone in our $400 million construction campaign.”
“The entire South Shore of Nassau County depends upon our Emergency Department during a medical crisis,” Cancellieri said in a statement. “These new units will help fulfill our mission to provide the best, most modern level of emergency care.”
