Open just two years, the Lancaster Rehabilitation Hospital already is growing.
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The county's first free-standing rehab hospital has begun a $2 million expansion that will add a self-contained brain-injury unit and allow the hospital to create a stroke unit.
The addition, to be completed in June, also will expand the hospital's therapy gym and add nine beds, bringing the total to 59.
The $13 million, one-story hospital on Good Drive opened in June 2007 on the Lancaster General Health Campus in East Hempfield Township.
It provides specialized care for patients who have had a traumatic accident, brain injury, stroke, amputation, complex orthopedic surgery or neurological problems due to a disease such as multiple sclerosis.
The hospital is expanding to meet an increased demand for services from not only local patients but patients from as far away as Philadelphia and Baltimore, said spokeswoman Tammy Derk.
About 15 percent of the hospital's patients come from outside Lancaster County.
The hospital also wanted to address patients' needs in a very specific way, Derk said.
That was what led to the creation of the self-contained brain-injury unit.
It is important for brain-injured patients to have a controlled, calm therapeutic environment, Derk said.
The current eight-bed brain-injury unit is separate from the rest of the hospital but does not include a therapy gym or a dining room, meaning patients have to leave the unit for those services.
The new 11-bed unit will have its own physical and occupational therapy gym, speech therapy suite and dining room.
The new unit also will include a room with a padded floor, for patients with a risk of falling. It will have some rooms with cameras in them, so nursing staff can monitor patients at all times.
The hospital also is creating an eight-bed stroke unit. Previously, stroke patients were mixed with other patients in one wing of the hospital.
Putting stroke patients on one unit allows staff and equipment to be focused on those patients' needs.
For example, neuropsychologists, specialized psychologists who treat patients with brain injuries and other neurological problems, could offer group therapy for stroke patients. Patients also could get specialized help for swallowing problems, common to stroke patients.
Also, the patients and their families will benefit just by being together, Derk said.
"A big part of the rehab environment and a benefit is having the ability to be with other patients and other families who are going through the same things as you are," Derk said.
The hospital admits patients age 14 and older. The average length of stay is about two weeks but some patients stay for months as they recover from an injury or disease.
Due to better medical care and technology, patients are surviving more severe trauma and injury, and emerging with greater rehab needs, Derk said.
"It has raised our need to meet that severity," she said.
The hospital is a joint venture of Lancaster General Hospital and Centerre Healthcare, based in St. Louis, Mo.
cstauffer@lnpnews.com
