Heber Valley Hospital completed a five-year renovation project earlier this month expanding bed capacity and the overall size of the facility.
Intermountain’s Heber Valley Hospital and Heber Valley Clinic now have a larger capacity for patients and surgeries after a completed expansion.
The hospital is now a third larger and bed capacity has been increased by 16%. The project added healthcare services and upgraded medical equipment capabilities.
One of the upgrades allows for telehealth in the facility. Si Hutt, an administrator at the hospital said all of the inpatient rooms now have monitors. Before, he said, patients would have to drive down to Salt Lake City for certain specialized services.
"We are able to keep some of those patients locally and just consult that specialist in," Hutt said. "We have that available for infectious disease, wound care, oncology and nephrology as well. And then we also provide that service in the emergency department."
While this is a huge benefit during the COVID-19 crisis, Hutt said these services were planned before the pandemic started.
"We were very much going in this direction anyway," he said. "Because it just makes sense for resource utilization, where you have a shortage of these specialists and are unlikely to be able to, to have one of those individuals live there in in Heber city and be available full time, we're able to involve them in the care of location as we need to."
Hutt said an increased number of women want to deliver their babies at the hospital, so the renovations also expanded nursing rooms and a new nursery.
And the center will also accommodate cancer treatment. Hutt said the hospital started offering chemotherapy in November.
