The University Medical Center hosted an open house and hiring party for its new Medical/Surgical StepDown Intermediate Critical Care Unit. The new unit will hold 45 patient beds for multi-purpose use.
“We take people from towns all over Lubbock. Right now on a daily basis we are housing 15-20 patients in our emergency center waiting for an inpatient bed,” Jessica Wolff, Director Intermediate Critical Care said.
Since they’re the only Level 1 Trauma Center in Lubbock, they see patients within a 350 mile radius. With that many patients they said sometimes their ER room has longer wait times.
“The new unit will help dramatically from bringing those patients from the ER and others coming from other ICU areas,” Andy Todd, a RN Charge Nurse for the new unit said.
Wolff said they will be hiring close to 80 nurses to cover the floor. She said several of the spots have already been filled from within but they’re still looking to hire about 10 overnight nurses.
The unit is set to open with 29 of the 45 beds on Monday September 18th.
