DUAL-PURPOSE BAYS Flexible patient bays can easily adapt to the day's scheduling demands.

Bay Watch
Bays Go From Pre-op to Post-op

When we expanded our surgery center from 6 to 8 ORs, we also included some flexible space in the plan — namely, dual-purpose pre-op/recovery bays — to improve our workflow efficiency. During the renovation, we built out 11 bays dedicated for pre-op patients as well as 10 for recovery. Five more bays located between those areas were designed to accommodate either part of the process: for pre-op use in the morning, when we could see several blocks of short cases being prepared at once, or easily converted to recovery beds in the afternoon, when more cases are winding down. Since our state maintains different medical gas requirements for pre-op and recovery bays, we constructed them all the same. We can also use the extra bays for turning over stretcher-beds between cases or conducting EKGs, labs and pre-admission tests so as not to tie up OR or procedure room space.

Ronald Bullock
The San Antonio (Texas) Orthopaedic Group
[email protected]