Rendering
Oct. 21, 2013 By Christian Murray
Elected officials and Mount Sinai executives broke ground on a six-story hospital building in Astoria this morning that will bolster emergency room services and surgical care.
The building, which is costing Mount Sinai $125 million to construct, will increase the size of the hospital’s emergency department from 4,000 to 20,000 square feet.
The expansion will also change the hospital’s focus more toward outpatient care, as it will allow for the addition of doctors and specialists, officials said.
There will be new specialists in cardiology, endocrinology, gastroenterology, orthopedics, and other disciplines. Furthermore, there will be a full imaging suite, including MRI, CT, bone density, mammography, X-Ray and ultrasound.
The new emergency department will be comprised of 36 treatment bays, eight observation beds, and an off-street drive through ambulance bay.
The facility aims to keep a keep pace with the rise in emergency room visits. According to a hospital report, the number of emergency room visits rose more than 13% from 2007 to 2011.
The expansion will also lead to the addition of seven new operating rooms—for a total of ten. The number of surgeries performed at the hospital has spiked nearly 40% from 2007 to 2011.
The hospital has seen its resources stretched in recent years because of population growth in the area, paired with the closing of several other prominent hospitals — Peninsula Hospital in Far Rockaway, St. John’s Hospital in East Elmhurst and St. Mary’s Hospital in Jamaica, among others.
Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer (D-Sunnyside), via Facebook, said that the “expansion will significantly improve health care delivery for residents living in Sunnyside, Woodside, Astoria and Long Island City.”
The hospital expects to complete construction in 2016. The new building will be located behind its current facility at 25-10 30th Ave.
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