As we kick off 2024, we’re excited to share the news that the renovations to our Waltham site are moving forward. The Waltham renovation project has officially been submitted to the Department of Public Health for review. These renovations will improve the onsite experience for patients, increase access to our pharmacy and enable us to see more patients who look to us for their care.
As part of the plan, the pharmacy will be moved into the northwest corner of the site currently occupied by the behavioral health counseling rooms. It will expand to 454 sq ft and the flow of prescription processing will be improved. The added inventory capacity will allow us to become licensed as a retail pharmacy to support the whole community as we grow.
The lobby will extend into the old pharmacy space for a total lobby space of 1400 sq ft. A new traffic pattern will have all check-ins at one streamlined registration desk where any waiting line will not block the main entrance. The waiting room will accommodate up to 45 people who can sit and wait comfortably and still allow for people who are ill to keep distance from other patients.
The current medical registration desk will be converted into two smaller, quick-access exam rooms to increase capacity for nursing visits. In the interim, to address the critical need for more exam space for providers and nurses to see patients at the Waltham site, we will complete the outfitting of two existing exam rooms which were left as shell space for future development when the site was originally built. We are in the process of acquiring the equipment and furnishings to turn these already licensed, but incomplete spaces, into functional exam rooms. With these two rooms and the additional rooms from the renovation we will have a total of 20 exam rooms, representing a 25% increase in primary care exam rooms.
This will be the final project funded under the HRSA American Rescue Plan Act which has supported many improvements to both our Brighton and Waltham clinics over the past three years. Our goal is to have the renovations completed and space fully licensed and occupied by July 1, 2024. We’ll keep you posted as we make progress on these important improvements!
