For those of you I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting, my name is Tom Gough and I’m the Senior Vice President & Administrator of Community Hospitals. That means I have the incredible opportunity to work with and for the community to make sure WakeMed North Hospital is the best place in the region to meet the growing health care needs of you and your neighbors.
Like much of the Triangle, northern Wake County and its surrounding areas continue to grow by leaps and bounds. It’s an exciting time to lead North Hospital as we keep pace with this growth – bringing new services, specialties and innovations in health care to you – the men, women and children of our valued community.
It’s all part of our commitment to advancing the capabilities and complex services we can deliver right here at your local community hospital. Here’s an overview of what’s new and next for WakeMed North Hospital.
What’s New?
New Name, Same Great Service
To better reflect the scope and services of all that’s offered to our patients, our new “official” name is WakeMed North Hospital. When the hospital opened in 2015, WakeMed North Family Health & Women’s Hospital accurately reflected our area of focus, but we’ve added a wide range of services for the whole family since then – and will continue to do so in the coming years.
Now Open! Intermediate Care Unit
As part of our goal of delivering the highest level of care to northern Wake County, we’ve recently opened a new, 6-bed intermediate care unit – designed to support patients with advanced illnesses or injuries that previously would have been transferred to another hospital. To support this change, we’ve hired and trained a dedicated team with experience in intermediate/step-down care – and have also increased our nursing ratios to allow extra hands to care for these more serious patients.
What’s Next?
Emergency Department Expansion
To support the growing needs of our community, we’re increasing the size and capacity of our emergency department with construction starting this spring. The project should take less than a year to complete and the new space will allow us to serve between 5,000 and 10,000 more patients per year.
With this expansion, we’ll be implementing a new dual-track model of care that will allow us to care for both minor injuries/illnesses as well as major/acute emergencies in a more efficient and streamlined manner. What does all of this mean for our patients? Shorter wait times and an enhanced experience!
New Imaging Services
North Hospital is adding an additional CT scanner this year to our suite of advanced imaging equipment. This second CT scanner will allow us to provide routine CT scans without any delay for emergency patients needing an urgent CT scan.
Advanced Cardiovascular Testing
To support our growing cardiovascular services offerings, we’re adding a variety of advanced diagnostic services for patients with cardiovascular symptoms.
With the addition of a new Doppler ultrasound machine, our Imaging team can better identify life-threatening conditions such as a potential blood clot, a blocked artery or a wide range of vascular problems.
Next, the addition of a new stress echo machine gives our team yet another tool for the rapid diagnosis of cardiovascular problems.
Finally, the addition of new staff in support of these advanced diagnostic services will allow us to expand the hours/availability of other existing services such as stress echocardiogram testing.
Thank you for reading and connecting with us. We look forward to keeping you healthy and happy, right here in northern Wake County.
-Tom
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