Hackensack (N.J.) University Medical Center opened a 530,000-square-foot, nine-story surgical and intensive care pavilion, Hackensack Meridian Health said Jan. 23.
The Helena Theurer Pavilion includes all-private patient rooms and "smart hospital" technology, as well as 24 operating rooms, 72 post-anesthesia care unit beds, 50 ICU beds, 175 medical/surgical beds, six da Vinci surgical robots, a musculoskeletal institute and four orthopedic robots for joint replacements.
A pod of six of the tower's ORs are designed to accommodate surgical robot systems, Hackensack Meridian said. The pod is surrounded by a substerile core that allows clinicians to move between ORs while remaining inside the sterile environment.
The pavilion also includes what the health system says is New Jersey’s first intraoperative MRI system, which is used during neurosurgical procedures to help neurosurgeons accurately remove tumors and treat conditions such as Parkinson’s disease and epilepsy.
The Helena Theurer Pavilion includes 12 negative pressure rooms to lower the risk of aerosolized disease transmission, Hackensack Meridian said. The entire pavilion can also be converted to a negative-pressure facility in the event of a future pandemic or public health emergency.