Emergency Department Expansion: The Valley Hospital's New Paramus Facility Accommodates More Patients Than Ever

PARAMUS, NJ — As the ambulance pulls into the emergency driveway, it waits a moment for the neighboring town’s rescue squad to pull out. Once inside, the EMT is unsure where to park the stretcher with all the rooms filled and patients overflowing into the hallways. This has been the scene at local hospitals in northern New Jersey for decades with continual population growth. At The Valley Hospital’s new $860 million facility in Paramus, all patients who enter the hospital through the emergency department will be spared the temporary hallway placement and find themselves immediately placed in a private room for care.

“They can go from their private ER room to their private inpatient room, which I think will be great,” explained the hospital’s Director of the Emergency Department and Emergency Services Rebecca Basso. An award-winning emergency nurse and certified EMT, she understands the balance between providing emergent care and enhancing the patient experience as part of the healing process.

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Designed in the early 1950s, the original Ridgewood hospital was imagined as a location that could serve a far smaller population than currently lives in northern Bergen County. According to the United States Census, at the time, the population county-wide was 539,000 compared to 955,000 today.

“We outgrew our space in Ridgewood a long time ago,” Basso said. “We had to utilize a lot of hallways, which is not ideal for patient privacy and care.” The state-of-the-art Paramus location places an emphasis on elevating the patient experience as a mechanism for improving the healing process. New high-tech equipment will allow medical staff to more rapidly and accurately assess patients, while room-service style dining will ensure patients eat what they like on their preferred schedule.

As part of the undertaking, hospital engineers and architects tried to keep future growth in mind. “We have more private rooms in Paramus than we had rooms and hallway spaces combined in Ridgewood,” Basso said. “We are optimistic in our ability to keep most of our patients in private rooms.” The facility will likely need the extra room, since Basso and other hospital officials anticipate that the new location will lead to increased patient volume.

More conveniently situated near the interstate highways, it is likely more local EMS agencies will bring patients to the Paramus emergency room. “Ahead of the move, we hosted an open house for local EMS agencies, and we had 135 people from 26 different agencies attend, 13 of whom were not located in our primary service area,” Ms. Basso said.

A move a few miles down the road could make a big difference in terms of patient volume, but the new facility is standing up tall to the task. Later this year, Valley will welcome its first class of internal medicine residents as part of a new graduate medical education collaboration with Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Combined with cutting-edge research and medical procedure development, the Paramus hospital continues making its presence known more widely in the region as a premier healthcare institution.

Read more Health & Wellness news from around Ridgewood here:

• The Valley Hospital Bids Goodbye to Ridgewood, Transporting Hundreds of Patients to New Facility in Paramus
• 1951 - 2024. Two Hospitals Later, Number Two Employee Reflects on the Journey of Community Hospital Turned Premier Health System
• Ridgewood Named a Healthy Town to Watch for Mayors Wellness Campaign

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