U-M Hospital Medical Procedure Unit to get $6 million addition and new look

Cutting edge concepts are a moving target, particularly in the medical field. Such is the case with the Medical Procedure Unit at the University of Michigan Hospital. At its meeting last month, the university's Board of Regents approved a $6 million expansion and renovation of the unit, considered a state of the art facility upon its opening in 1991. Plans call for a three-phase renovation of 2,200 square feet of existing space and a 4,000-square-foot addition.

Visiting patients primarily see gastroenterologists for routine items from upper endoscopy and colonoscopy to more complex treatments. Bronchoscopy, a pulmonary procedure, is also done there. Fifteen to 20 percent of procedures are inpatient, and the rest are outpatient, says Dr. Grace Elta, medical director of the Medical Procedure Unit and a professor of internal medicine at U-M.

Two interventional endoscopy rooms will be added by virtue of the fact that the advanced endoscopy field has grown considerably in the last 15 years, Elta says. "It's just going to equip us for new procedures, more expanded use of anesthesia assistance than we've ever had before, and that just really modernizes everything we're doing. It allows us to have more space to do these complex interventional techniques, many of which we didn't do several years ago."

Another phase will add prep and recovery space to the unit, which currently has 21 recovery bays. Eight more will be added, and healthy and ill patients will be separated in the new configuration. The waiting room, which currently has inadequate seating, will also be enlarged. Some visitors are issued beepers so they may wait in the cafeteria or other parts of the hospital.

The project should start by June 1 and be complete within one year, Elta estimates. "We do about 15,000 procedures a year so we expect that number to tick up when the whole expansion is finished."

Source: Dr. Grace Elta, medical director of the Medical Procedure Unit; University of Michigan Board of Regents
Writer: Tanya Muzumdar