93.9 The Eagle – The News and Talk of Columbia, MO
MU Health Care says last week’s move of its pediatric emergency services from Columbia’s Keene facility to University Hospital required comprehensive planning and preparation.
MU Women’s and Children’s hospital executive director Christina Hoff Vollrath says about two dozen departments worked together to make the move.
“We moved our pediatric service line, so that encompasses our pediatric emergency services, our pediatric inpatient units to include the PICU, our pediatric surgeries, our blood disorder cancer unit, our procedure suite,” she says.
She spoke on 939 the Eagle’s “CEO Round Table” on Saturday morning. The new University Hospital location will have child life services and a facility dog. It’s solely dedicated to children with kid-specific care teams, equipment and décor.
Hoff Vollrath also says the pediatric emergency services have gained space and beds with the move.
“We gained some additional beds. MU Health Care at the University Hospital gained some additional beds, you know, beds that we had taken out of service for offices and such over the years. So we renovated those, we renovated two particular, for the inpatients the PICU and the inpatient pediatric floor, we renovated those floors and made them very kid-friendly,” says Hoff Vollrath.
Pediatric patients requiring emergency care should now visit the children’s emergency room at University Hospital. The move is the first step in creating a centralized hospital campus.
