EXCLUSIVE: Behind the Scenes at the New Fort Belvoir Community Hospital Part 6

The final touches are being given to the $1 billion Fort Belvoir Community Hospital. Last week, Patch was given exclusive access to the fifth and final portion of the hospital: The Oaks Pavilion.

The state-of-the-art, 1.3 million-square-foot hospital will open on August 10. It replaces the 54-year-old Dewitt Army Community Hospital and is located on the grounds of Belvoir's former Southern Post golf course.

The inpatient rooms are state-of-the-art and feature Smart Suite technology. "Everything (medications, possible infections, allergies) that you would need to know before you enter the room will be posted on an electronic screen just outside the door," said Dr. Rick Repeta, director of integration and transition at the hospital. "It essentially replaces a lot of either sticky notes or things we see sometimes in other hospitals. This is really an electronic way to do that [and it is] tied to the electronic medical record as well."  

Hospital staff will be required to swipe an identification badge before entering a room so that the patient will be able to see who is at the door. And by using a TV remote, patients will be able to watch movies, order meals, control the lighting of the room, adjust the shades and change the room temperature by three degrees. 

The transition is part of the 2005 Base Realignment and Closure Act, and the new hospital will take over some of the services provided at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.  

"[The hospital] is a significant departure from the capabilities we have at Dewitt today," said Repeta. "We typically run about 15-20 inpatient beds on a daily basis. In this hospital we'll have up to 120 available, and we look to run probably 90-100 of those every day."

The structure is broken up into five pavilions: River, Eagle, Sunrise, Meadow and Oaks.

The Oaks Pavilion has seven floors and includes: 

• Emergency department 
• Psychiatric unit 
• Labor/delivery/postpartum unit
• Operating rooms
• Cafeteria  
• Hospital education and training area 

"Even though we're opening on August 10, we don't anticipate that we're going to start up everything all at the same time," said Repeta. "We'll be taking everything that we do at Dewitt today and moving that into this building, and then, over the course of the next month or so, really beginning to ramp up all those extra services that will be coming down from Walter Reed."  

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