An opening date is set for Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital!
After a decade-long journey, an incredible amount of hard work and the many challenges we continue to face with the COVID-19 pandemic, Mackenzie Health is excited to share that our two-hospital future is becoming reality. We will be opening Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital as a full-service hospital for our community on Sunday, June 6.
Please note that until Sunday, June 6 at 10 a.m., the emergency department at Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital will remain closed.
All this and more in this special edition of the Insider.
This is the right time to open our second hospital
Since we opened Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital in February exclusively to support the province’s pandemic response and the GTA Incident Management System (IMS), it has provided much-needed relief to the health-care system. We have recently cared for the highest proportion of COVID-19 patients in Ontario caring for 514 patients transferred to date, helping to prevent the system from collapse during the most challenging wave of the pandemic.
We have been proud to support our community and our province in this way, and we will continue to provide support to our neighbouring hospitals. However, our emergency department at Mackenzie Richmond Hill Hospital, one of the busiest in Ontario, is under considerable and unsustainable strain and the number of patients requiring an inpatient bed is outnumbering available staffed beds.
Although capacity pressures like these are not new for Mackenzie Health, COVID-19 has magnified these challenges. Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital is needed now more than ever to provide the access to care our community has long needed and deserved.
We are starting to see a decline of COVID-19 cases in hospitals, including in ICUs across the province, which is a good sign that things are going in the right direction. Because of this, along with the ramp up in the provincial rollout of the vaccines, we feel now is the right time to open Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital as a full-service hospital for our community.
This means that our Woman and Child, Inpatient Mental Health and Inpatient Integrated Stroke programs, along with our emergency department and other core services, will open to the community at Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital on June 6.
It also means that our community will have double the access to care. Mackenzie Health will be two hospitals, each with a full-service emergency department, and core services such as surgery, medicine and critical care along with specialized programs. Our community-based locations and services will continue to provide additional support to western York Region.
The ultimate in care at Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital
Dr. Plenk, Chief and Medical Director of the Department of Medicine, pictured here in a patient room at Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital, delivers the ultimate in care to patients.
We look forward to welcoming babies in our new hospital where moms will be able to labour, deliver and receive postpartum care in the same private room with plenty of space and an extra bed for family to spend the night.
We will soon be able to provide expert and compassionate care to inpatients struggling with mental health challenges in care areas with plenty of natural light and access to tranquil courtyards to experience the healing powers of nature.
Patients following a stroke will be cared for in the new home of the award-winning Sorbara District Stroke Centre for York Region. Patients will have access to an exercise gym and walking track to help regain mobility following a stroke and an independent living suite to ease their transition home to an improved quality of life.
We will be able to provide emergent and urgent care to all patients who come to us for care in our 37,000 square foot Magna Emergency, offering state-of-the-art equipment and technology and a unique triage process that keeps the patient at the centre of our focus.
We cannot wait to be able to double access to care for our community. On Sunday, June 6, Mackenzie Health will finally become two hospitals, each with a full-service emergency department, core services including surgery, medicine and critical care along with specialized programs at each.
Please note the emergency department at Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital will remain closed until 10 a.m. on Sunday, June 6, 2021.
Thank you to our Mackenzie Health family
*All photos adhered to all public health guidelines in place at the time the photos were taken.
This milestone would not have been possible without the support of our Mackenzie Health family – our staff, physicians, volunteers, donors, government and community partners and residents of our community. Thank you, we are so grateful!
Stay tuned for more updates …