TowerScope Volume 11, Issue Nr. 11, November 1974

              We're Part of
Poison Control Effort
"My baby got into the stuff in the medicine
cabinet�he's unconscious!" Such desperate cries for
help are handled with instant efficiency thru the
Rocky Mountain Poison Control Center, and Saint
Joseph Hospital is now part of the team.
In order to start treatment, it must be determined
what toxic substance is involved, its composition, and
what detoxification steps must be taken. In the
Emergency Department, we now have a microfiche
machine which supplies such information in a hurry.
An index of common household products and other
substances that can be toxic directs the Emergency
personnel to the proper quad for information on the
composition of the product, which in turn directs
them to the management or treatment information
quad. Drug imprint cards and mushroom-profile cards
provide further identification knowledge. We will also
have profile cards on snakes, spiders and such
varmints.
Nurse practitioners on duty around the clock at the
Rocky Mountain Poison Control Center take emer-
gency calls and direct the caller to the nearest Poison
Control Hospital (which may be Saint Joseph). They
also record the vital statistics and instructions given
to the caller, and this information is transmitted
directly by Xerox Telecopier. We will have a Tele-
copier soon.
Poison Control � just one more example of the
lifesaving measures provided at Saint Joseph!
Proud Father at '71
Concerning Constructions
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Just about all fathers are proud, but when you're 71 and your
first baby is born, you're "ready to bust" with pride. And so it
was with Frank Williams and his wife. Alberta, when 8-lb.,
5V2-OZ. baby girl, Francine, was born at Saint Joseph on
October 16. They were even featured on television!
Former   Candy   Striper   room   will   house helipad elevator
What's going on, and what's going up? Well, workmen
are busily (and noisily) preparing for the helipad to
be located on top of the north tower. This means
installing concrete pipe columns down through the
11th floor as extensions of existing structural col-
umns. These columns will support the octagonally-
shaped helipad to be constructed of poured-in-place
concrete over reinforcing steel. A net safety fence will
surround the helipad.
Patients will be transported from the helicopters via a
short ramp to a new one-story elevator which will
take them from the 12th floor to the 11th floor-and A
thence to any area of the Hospital. It is anticipaterj^fc
that the helipad will be completed in January, 75.
Saint Joseph Hospital will NOT have its own heli-
copter service. Several commercial air ambulance
companies will be available to transport patients to
and from our Hospital on an emergency or scheduled
basis.
The parking garage? As of this writing, one more
floor of concrete will be poured, topping the struc-
ture. This will serve as a roof and outdoor parking
area. Thus, the garage will consist of three parking
floors (one underground) plus the rooftop area.
New acquisitions that help make our physical plant
the most advanced in the region include a new
incinerator to be installed in one corner of the
present underground parking. It ensures a far more
efficient way of disposing of our wastes; the tempera-
ture reaches 1900 degrees, thereby taking care of the
air pollution problem, and it can handle 750 pounds
of waste material an hour. Chutes to the incinerator
already exist in the Hospital.
In   Central   Supply,   a   new   cart  washer  has  been
installed that will wash a cart and its soiled contentr^k
in  one  operation.   Laundry  now has an additionarW
washer that handles 400 pounds of laundry at once,"
and new sheet-spreading and folding equipment to
take care  of  the  more  than  3 million pounds of
laundry processed per year!