 Sharon Roush explains how a new facility gave this medical center a more efficient home.
Capital Regional Medical Center has served the needs of its community for more than 25 years. However, in 1999 it became clear that the founding facility was no longer adequate to meet those needs. Originally built with the option of becoming a hotel if the “hospital thing” didn’t work out, the facility was designed without many of the operational efficiencies Tallahassee’s growing population required.
 Sharon Roush, CEO
“My first job as CEO was to build a business plan for a replacement hospital,” Roush said. “We developed strategies around the operations of the new facility, growing our staff, developing additional key service lines, and continuing to provide high quality customer service.”
Creating the space
Capital Regional Medical Center was founded by a group of physicians in 1979. At the time, the physicians weren’t sure a second hospital would make it in Tallahassee, hence the convertible hospital-to-hotel design. Each patient room was semi-private and had an air conditioner.
The hospital started out small and, over the years, went through a number of renovations and additions, including an ICU expansion. But because of the original layout, expansion in all departments was not possible. “Our imaging department was located right in the middle of the hospital, so to expand, I would need to relocate the imaging department or start bumping into OR,” Roush explained. “HCA engaged Michael Graves, a world-renown architect, to do some of the design work on the new facility to ensure the operational inefficiencies of the old facility didn’t get passed along.”
In 2003, Capital Regional Medical Center moved into its new home, a 198-bed, all-private patient room facility with state-of-the-art technology, including a robotic pharmacy and a 64-slice CT. The first and second floors are dedicated to outpatient services; the ED is located on the second floor, immediately adjacent to the imaging center. Two steps further down the hallway is the cath lab, followed closely by the OR.
“The hospital now has a logical flow, which can be attributed to two things,” Roush said. “First, we started from scratch. Second, we doubled our square footage. We finally had the space to expand to meet the needs of our community.”
Filling the space
When looking at what should fill that space, Roush and her team investigated each of the hospital’s service lines to see which had the greatest growth potential. Cardiology was the number one focus, as the old facility’s catheterization services were separated, with inpatient services in the facility and a freestanding outpatient clinic located close by.
“As you can imagine, the process was extremely inefficient,” Roush said. “We had to staff both facilities, and physicians were running back and forth.” The new facility has five cath labs, provides interventional radiology and vascular services, and has a dedicated preparation and recovery area.
Capital Regional Medical Center’s orthopedic and cardiology service lines also underwent significant transformations. The hospital’s physical therapy department is now housed in a U-shaped orthopedic wing that both promotes efficiencies and greater patient safety. “The nurses’ station overlooks the entire floor, and it’s now easier to mobilize our patients. In addition, our cardiology department received accreditation in chest pain and stroke care,” Roush said.
A natural state
Although only four years old, Capital Regional Medical Center is already in need of expansion. When designing the new facility in 1999, the hospital saw roughly 19,000 ED visits per year. This year Roush projects the hospital will see 52,000.
“We projected growth in Tallahassee but not at the level we’ve experienced,” she said. “Unfortunately, our ED is starting to see a little bit of backlog.”
In addition to adding six treatment bays, Capital Regional Medical Center has engaged a consulting firm to look at streamlining opportunities. The firm will also help the administration decide what the hospital’s next phase of expansion will be, whether on location or in another part of the community.
But being in flux is almost a natural state for the hospital. Because HCA’s division office is in Tallahassee, the hospital is often the pilot site for technological innovations. What initially started as a project to track movable equipment, such as IV pumps and wheelchairs, has turned into a program to potentially improve ED throughput.
“Our goal is to tag our ED patients with an RFID chip so our physicians can track the path their patients take through the process when they pull up their rounding sheets,” Roush explained. “If all goes well, the program will help them locate their patients and use their time more efficiently.”
As the smaller of the two hospitals in Tallahassee (the competition is licensed for 770 beds), Capital Regional Medical Center’s reputation has, in large part, been based on its small, family-like atmosphere. As Roush looks to the future of the hospital, she plans to incorporate the same values she did when she first arrived at the hospital eight years ago.
“We want to keep the same feel that our old facility had, even though we’re in a larger building. Rather than telling our employees they need to escort our patients from department to department, we incorporate those kinds of actions into our processes, and that’s made all the difference. Even though we are not the largest hospital in town, we pride ourselves on the personal care we provide each and every patient.”
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