With ICU beds and personnel to staff them at a premium, Napa County is reopening a hospital closed by the Glass Fire just in time.
The sprawling campus of the Adventist Health St. Helena Hospital in Deer Park was approved to reopen Monday, 10 weeks after the fire destroyed some of its employee housing, damaged water and electrical systems and almost burned the hospital itself.
“It’s a very detailed, very detailed survey looking at major pieces of equipment, seeing if they were functioning normally and just really wanting to ensure that everything was safe and ready for patient care,” explained Dr. Steven Herber, hospital president and CEO, of the regulatory process to reopen.
Saving the 151-bed acute care hospital building from the fire was a Herculean effort by the hospital’s own fire department.
Physicians and staff cheered the news.
“They’ve been so anxious to get back to taking care of patients and they’re really elated to get this news,” said Dr. Herber.
The reopening adds an additional 12 ICU beds to the county’s overall capacity, doubling the number of available beds left in Napa County, which had dwindled to just 11.
“We have sister hospitals that are really very full and they want to transfer some patients to us as soon as we open those doors,” he said, and Dr. Herber expects the hospital will be full again shortly. “We’re hoping not to see further surge but we’re really anxiously waiting to see in the next few days if there’s any increase that might result from what people chose to do at Thanksgiving time.”
The hospital reopened Tuesday morning.