CaroMont Health, Gastonia Critical Care Expansion

Originally built in 1973, the existing 435-bed CaroMont Regional Medical Center in Gastonia required infrastructure upgrades in its critical care rooms to meet the space requirements and medical equipment needs of modern medicine.

McMillan Pazdan Smith developed a design to add additional critical care rooms to the main campus. The four-story project will be constructed on top of the existing operating suite, which was originally designed to be expanded vertically. The design minimizes disruption to the existing suite below by placing elevator banks outside the footprint of the surgical suite and incorporates an interstitial floor.

Each floor will have 26 patient rooms, support space, staff space, and dedicated family space. One side of the tower is dedicated to family and visitors at the front of the hospital and connects to the Patient Resource Center. The opposite side of the tower is dedicated to staff, patients, and logistics at the back of the hospital. This location connects to the existing back of house corridor, for contiguous circulation with the entire hospital. A new bridge on the fourth level connects the new critical care tower to the existing 1973 tower at the same level for staff, logistics, and patient discharge.