6/05/08

Arlington hospital set to expand

by Beckye Randall

Arlington’s Cascade Valley Hospital is embarking on a major construction project and the community was invited to celebrate the groundbreaking on Saturday, May 31.

The festive event at the hospital, located at 330 S. Stillaguamish Avenue, featured activities for kids, blood pressure and glucose monitoring booths, safety displays and a free lunch of hot dogs, hamburgers and ice-cold watermelon.

Before an appreciative crowd of onlookers, former hospital commissioner Ray McClure was inducted into the facility’s Wall of Honor. McClure, a lifelong Arlington resident, served on the commission for more than 20 years. Following his retirement from that post, he led the campaign to pass the bond funding the hospital’s expansion.

Members of the hospital district’s Board of Commissioners then donned hard hats and wielded gold-tipped shovels for the ceremonial groundbreaking.

According to commissioner Tina Davis, the $45 million expansion and remodeling project will better serve the citizens of Arlington and surrounding communities.

“With the bond passage, it was clear that the public recognized the need for improved facilities. The emergency room was a real concern. Patients often had to sit in halls, and the entrance was hard to access,” said Davis.

The expansion will create a 16-bed emergency facility on the main floor, which will share space with a new patient admitting area. The second floor of the addition will house the imaging, respiratory therapy and oncology departments, a laboratory, chapel and a cafe.

Meanwhile the existing building will undergo an extensive cosmetic remodel, with new carpeting, cabinets, light fixtures and nurses’ stations among the planned upgrades.

Connie DeGregorio, the hospital’s assistant administrator in charge of the construction project, expects completion in the fall of 2009.

“We’re adding 40,000 square feet of patient service area,” she said, “including an enhanced family birthing center and a larger, more functional surgical area.”

The hospital staff plans to post progress updates and even offer live webcam views of the ongoing construction on the CVH Web site at www.cascadevalley.org.

Arlington General Hospital was built in 1909 and the facility has seen many changes in the nearly 100 years since. In 1964 the community voted to form a hospital taxing district, purchasing the struggling hospital and renaming it Cascade Valley Hospital (CVH).

Since the 1960s the hospital has been remodeled twice and many services have been added. A new hospital was built on the CVH campus in 1987, increasing the number of available beds and providing space for the organization’s ever-increasing menu of health services.

Today the Cascade Valley Hospital & Clinics (CVH&C) health system includes the hospital and a variety of primary care and specialty clinics located in Arlington, Smokey Point, North Marysville, Granite Falls and Darrington.