It's not unusual for 50 to 60 patients to fill the waiting room at Anne Arundel Medical Center's emergency department, built less than eight years ago. Some are connected to intravenous units or holding icepacks but cannot get an open room.
"We moved into an emergency room that was already too small," said Dr. David Mooradian, a physician at the Annapolis-area hospital.
The same is true at Baltimore Washington Medical Center in Glen Burnie, where the emergency department was expanded in 1999. The staff there treats 90,000 people a year, 50 percent more than the capacity for which it was designed.
The county's two hospitals are in the midst of major expansions meant to meet growing demand by greatly increasing their capacity and offering new services.
AAMC is opening a parking garage with more than 400 spaces next week as part of its $424 million "Vision 2010." In addition to the new garage and an Ambulatory Services Pavilion, where many affiliated doctors will move their outpatient practices, the hospital will build a new emergency room and a seven-story tower with 50 private rooms and eight more operating rooms.
Martin L. "Chip" Doordan, president and chief executive officer of Anne Arundel Health System, the nonprofit organization that runs AAMC, attributed much of the growth to age demographics.
"The baby boomers are coming of age where they're going to require a lot more care," he said.
At the same time, more people are choosing to give birth at the hospital. AAMC is second in the state for annual births, with its 5,500 deliveries trailing only Shady Grove Adventist in Montgomery County. In addition to the $17 million neonatal intensive care unit built last year, the hospital is adding a pediatric care unit to its new emergency room.
Baltimore Washington Medical Center is adding an obstetrics unit as part its $117 million project to expand its emergency room, build a six-story glass tower and add 111 private rooms for a total of 40 new beds by next year.
A segment of the new emergency room with 17 new rooms will be completed next week, bringing the total number of rooms to 63. The entire expanded facility is expected to be completed by July.
"With the expansion of Fort Meade, a lot of new homes are coming. We saw the need for meeting the demand," hospital spokeswoman Allison Eatough said.
Both hospitals have had to adjust to avoid interrupting patient care.
