“It’s very calming,” said Raegan Ward, RN, MSN, CEN, nurse educator. “It doesn’t feel like a hospital.”
Bonney-Corson agreed. “It’s spa-like,” she said. “I had to listen. I expected there to be a waterfall.”
The peaceful atmosphere makes for a more relaxed and engaged staff, she added. “It’s a place you want to
work.”
Of course, patient comfort isn’t only about the hospital’s physical space. Because of its proximity to a boarding
school with a diverse student body, the hospital often gets patients who don’t speak English well or at all.
Additionally, it has patients who use American Sign Language.
It is a scary prospect to be ill or injured in a hospital where no one can understand you and you can’t understand
anyone. Until recently, the hospital would call a third-party agency out of Bangor, which would send an
interpreter from somewhere in Maine. This solution was both time-consuming and expensive—costing
hundreds of dollars for each patient encounter.
Recently, the hospital began using Stratus Video Interpreting. Using an iPad, hospital personnel can
economically access a medically trained interpreter via video or audio over a secure network within seconds.
Both Ward and Bonney-Corson can recall waiting and waiting with frightened and increasingly anxious patients
for an interpreter to show up.
“No one can even explain that you’re waiting for an interpreter,” Peterson said, adding that the more efficient
Stratus solution is both better for the patient and better for the hospital’s bottom line.
The service will soon be available at all EMHS (Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems) hospitals.
This is what the new patient rooms look like. Most of the rooms are private and have plenty of
room for family to visit.
Sebasticook Valley Health
