Roger Blanza, BSN, RN, 8C NIC, tested the movable artwork panel that
covers the service lines in the headwall.
With input from patients, their families and hospital staff, the inpatient rooms for the Carl J. and Ruth Shapiro Cardiovascular Center is designed to improve patient experiences and care delivery. “The rooms truly demonstrate patient/family centered care,” said Mary Lou Moore, MSN, RN, CCRN, director of Cardiovascular Nursing and Clinical Services.
All the rooms are private and designed to enable the patient to have the support of the family during their hospitalization. Within each room, there is a designated family space that supports family presence. “These rooms are designed to respect the dignity of each individual during what could be some of life’s most difficult moments,” Moore said.
When it opens in spring 2008, the Shapiro Center will have 40 intensive care rooms and 96 telemetry or step-down rooms, and each of the 96 step-down rooms could convert to an ICU room. “As the population ages, we may see an increasing acuity in our cardiovascular patients, particularly in an academic medical center like BWH,” Moore said. “These easily-converted rooms offer the flexibility to provide the best care for our patients in a changing environment.”
A temporary model Shapiro patient room was built in the basement of 221 Longwood Ave. for staff to tour and offer feedback as equipment and furnishings decisions were being made. Plans are in place to rebuild that model room on L1 in the Tower next year.
“Based on the staff feedback, we repositioned call lights and redesigned the bathroom, and all these changes are more supportive of patient care,” Moore said.
Each room includes a small couch that pulls out into a single bed big enough to accommodate a 6-foot, 5-inch person. The rooms boast two televisions, one flat-screen panel on a movable arm to enable a patient to position it where he or she wants, and the second television for family and visitors. In addition, the headwall features artwork that can cover up the all the services that are housed within it, such as oxygen, suction, monitoring cables and invasive lines.
“They’ll be out of sight for patients who do not need those services,” Moore said.
Planning is continuing on the design of the Hill-Rom boom as it’s being customized for the Shapiro Center, Moore said.
The design of the patient rooms and inpatient units embraces a decentralized nurses’ station that allows nurses and care providers full bedside visibility when needed. Included in the design is a secure medication “pass-through” cabinet with an outside door that allows Pharmacy Services to deliver medications from the hall and an inside door for the nurse to receive medications without leaving the patient room.
Cardiac Surgery Nurse Managers Alison Gilmore and Sarah Thompson with
Mary Lou Moore, director of Cardiovascular Nursing, and BWH COO Kate
Walsh in a model of the patient room for the Shapiro Center.