Sherman work progresses; staff prepares for move
If you're launching new restaurant, you could have a "soft opening" to work out the kinks.
Sure, the food may not taste the best or a dish might be cold, but it's not life or death, right?
That's not really an option if you're opening a $325 million, 225-bed hospital.
To that end, staff members at Sherman Hospital in Elgin this fall will be putting in plenty of training time preparing for the west side facility's opening on Dec. 15.
"We'll evaluate what went well and what didn't so when we move in everything is safe and functional," said Joan Kanute, operations facilitator for the new hospital and clinical nutrition manager.
Sherman's east-side facility on Center Street has had seven additions over the years, the first in 1927 and the last in 2001.
The new, replacement hospital at the northeast corner of Randall and Big Timber roads is planned with a layout to improve efficiency for those who work there.
For example, the maternity section is next to the nearly 5,000-square-foot special care nursery.
But the flip side is tools and supplies are in different places and routines that have been galvanized by years of repetition must change less than six months from now.
One exercise will be a "Day in the Life" event where the new facility will be staffed for a full 24-hour period.
But it won't stop there.
For example, nurses will have 20 to 30 hours of training at the new facility, said Linda Deering, Sherman's chief operating officer.
"It will absolutely be job specific." Deering said.
On a recent tour, the interior looked drastically different from a year earlier when hospital leaders showed off the facility's 15-acre geothermal lake.
The atrium is now home to the steel trunks of the Tree of Life, which rises to the ceiling.
Some patient rooms, which overlook the lake and have southern exposure, already have beds and couches and are very close to being finished.
Operating rooms that are more than 600 square feet but still await equipment look cavernous compared to the 400-square-foot operating rooms at the old campus.
A winding set of two-story windows lets natural light pour into a cafeteria that also faces the lake.
For details, visit thefutureofsherman.com.