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Lahey Hospital & Medical Center unveiled a new Emergency Department on January 12, designed to expand clinical service capabilities and bring patients and their families’ greater privacy and convenience during treatment. LHMC operates the only Level II trauma center between Boston and Manchester, New Hampshire, providing time-sensitive, critical care for northeastern Massachusetts. The new Emergency Department is now four times the size as it previously was and 65% of it was paid for through philanthropic donations. The new facility will be open and ready for patients starting January 25.

Governor Baker, who has close ties with the healthcare industry in Massachusetts, proudly spoke at the unveiling at the Burlington hospital. Previously Chief Executive Officer of Harvard Pilgram Healthcare from 1999 to 2009, Governor Baker led the company in becoming the top healthcare plan in the country for member satisfaction and clinical effectiveness. 

“One of the things that’s been most interesting to me is to watch this facility morph over that period of time [28-30 years],” Governor Baker says. “The number of changes that have taken place here and the number of new developments as both the financing world has changed, as the care delivery models have changed, as the relationships between the buyers and providers and providers and payers and providers and government have changed, has actually been, in some respects, a pleasure to watch because this is an organization that understands and recognizes how important its traditions are, but is perfectly capable of adapting to a changing marketplace, a changing context, a changing clinical world, and a changing set of approaches.”

During the ceremony, Governor Baker was joined by Dr. Howard Grant, President and CEO of Lahey Health, Ann-Ellen Hornidge, Chair of Lahey Health Board of Trustees,  Ann Marie Connolly, Chair of the Lahey Clinic Foundation Board of Trustees, and Dr. Joanne Conroy, CEO of Lahey Hospital & Medical Center.

“Our community hospitals have grown significantly. And in return, the complicated patients who can’t be safely cared for in those settings have increasingly been referred to Lahey Hospital and Medical Center where we’re delivering world class care, and closer to their homes,” Dr. Grant says. “As Ann-Ellen described, the new ED is mission critical for that system, because we’re taking care of so many more complicated patients from our system, we weren’t able to do so in the old facility and when January 25 arrives and at 7am the patients walk through the door, we’ll be in a whole new era of the Lahey Health system.”

The speaking program was followed by a ribbon-cutting ceremony and tours of the new emergency department, led by Malcolm Creighton, MD, FACEP Chair, Emergency Medicine Department Division Chair, Hospital-Based Specialties. 

For more information on the hospital, visit http://www.lahey.org.