Providence Swedish announced on Dec. 5 it would make improvements to its services in Southwest Washington, which includes expanding Providence St. Peter Hospital in Olympia.
As part of the expansion, 51 new beds will be added, including 42 new beds for observation patients and hospital stay outpatients, and nine new beds for procedural patients. The expansion will also include technology upgrades at the hospital, which include the addition of what the hospital system calls the “latest technology” for heart catheterization procedures at two of St. Peter’s Cardiac Cath Labs.
An additional three Computerized Tomography (CT) Scanners will be added at St. Peter Hospital and Providence Centralia Hospital.
A new outpatient physical and speech therapy office was also recently opened in Lacey to allow future hospital inpatient bed expansion.
“We are responding to the growth of our community and will continue to serve as the leading health provider in the South Puget Sound. We appreciate the trust our patients have given us,” said Darin Gross, the chief executive of Providence Swedish South Puget Sound. “We are compelled to meet the needs of all who come to us for care. As a nonprofit hospital, our focus is on reinvesting in our ability to improve the health of communities. Adding staffing and capacity — and investing in our community remains a top priority, made even more necessary by the complicated issues we are facing today.”
Providence Swedish has served the Puget Sound region since the first Providence hospital opened in Seattle in 1877 and the first Swedish hospital opened in 1910. The two systems affiliated in 2012 and together are the largest health care provider in Western Washington, with 22,000 caregivers, eight hospitals and 244 clinics. Providence St. Peter Hospital is currently a 372-bed regional teaching hospital. Providence Centralia Hospital is a 128-bed hospital.
