Nearly 7,500 guests were welcomed during pre-opening celebrations of the new Intermountain Health Lutheran Hospital in Wheat Ridge, Colorado, thanking leaders and donors and offering a look inside the new 620,000-square-foot hospital.
Intermountain Lutheran Hospital President Andrea Burch joined Wheat Ridge Mayor Bud Starker and local chambers of commerce for a ribbon-cutting at the hospital entrance on Saturday, July 20. Doors were then opened for guided tours, where guests viewed areas such as the emergency room, neonatal intensive care unit, the labor and delivery unit and main lobby. Entertainment in the parking lot along with educational booths from different hospital departments and Intermountain Health Medical Group were also provided.
The new campus replaces the original Lutheran Medical Center, which was built in 1961. The campus was founded in 1905 as a tuberculosis sanitorium.
“The truth is that even a renovation would not have brought us the same benefits as starting from scratch and building the hospital over,” Burch said at the Saturday event. New construction will accommodate advanced technology today and into the future.
The new hospital features a helipad on its roof with direct access to the trauma rooms, labor and delivery and stroke care. The design is more efficient with procedural areas close together and the heart cath lab close to the emergency room.
Much like the current hospital, the new Lutheran facility will have 226 licensed beds and maintain its Level 2 trauma designation. It will continue to be the only hospital in Jefferson County that delivers babies.
Burch said she was especially proud of the art project at the new hospital. Of the more than 600 pieces of art to be installed, nearly all were created by residents of Wheat Ridge or Colorado.
The new hospital is scheduled to open Aug. 3 when the former emergency room will close at 6 a.m. and the new one will open. At 8 a.m., caregivers, with about 20 ambulances, will move an estimated 180 patients from the former hospital to the new location.
The project team for the replacement hospital included Barton Malow-Haselden joint-venture, HDR and Cummings Group. For more details, visit intermountainhealthcare.org/locations/intermountain-health-lutheran-hospital.
