Children's Ready to Move

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh is gearing up for its big move. Starting at 6:00 Saturday morning the Emergency Department at the Oakland facility will close and all new emergency cases will be taken at the new hospital in Lawrenceville. Starting at 7:00am, every patient in the hospital will be put into ambulances and moved to the new building. Children’s Vice President for medical affairs Steven Docimo says 40 ambulances from around the region will be used with the goal of having all the patients moved in 8-12 hours. He says no streets will be closed but Pittsburgh Police officers will be posted at key intersections to make sure traffic moves smoothly. Docimo says the hospital has been trying to lower its census over the last few weeks. They have stopped scheduling elective surgeries and each department has had a census reduction plan in place. The goal was to have just 150 patients in the hospital at the time of the move. Docimo says as of Friday morning there were 190 in-patients and it looks like the number Saturday morning will be closer to 160. He says the increase is due to a recent up tick in emergency room admissions. Docimo says over the last few months Saturday morning census counts have ranged from 220 to 250.