Surgical Suites

The Surgical Suites portfolio provides patient focused care and services for people requiring surgery. Care is provided by specialized teams in the Operating Rooms, Minor Surgical Clinics, and the Post Anaesthetic Care Units. Services to support care in these areas are provided by the Processing and Case Cart areas, the Operating Room Information Systems Team and Equipment and Supply managers and Coordinators.

The Surgical Suites Portfolio:

• Consists of many different areas and teams of people with specialized knowledge and skills, all of whom are committed to ensuring timely access to surgical care that is safe and of the highest quality.
• Teams work collaboratively in a highly technological environment
• Care is patient focused.
• Is committed to excellence in care, research and education.  

Table of Contents

• Operating Rooms  
• Minor Operating Rooms and Surgical Clinics
• Post Anesthetic Care Units
• Central Sterile Processing and Case Carts
• Operating Room Information System     

Operating Rooms (OR)

Foothills Hospital has 23 operating rooms for inpatient and outpatient surgeries. Services provided in the main ORs include:

• Anaesthesia
• Cardiac services
• Ear Nose and Throat (ENT)
• General Surgery Gynecology/Obstetrics
• Neurology
• Orthopedics
• Plastics
• Thoracic
• Transplant
• Trauma

Peter Lougheed Hospital has 14 operating rooms for inpatient and outpatient surgeries. Services provided in the main ORs include:

• Anesthesia
• Ear Nose and Throat (ENT)
• General Surgery
• Gynecology/Obstetrics
• Oral Maxilla Facial
• Orthopedics
• Plastics
• Podiatry
• Vascular

Rockyview General Hospital has 14 operating rooms for inpatient and outpatient surgeries. Services provided in the main ORs include:

• Anaesthesia
• Ear Nose and Throat (ENT)
• General Surgery
• Gynecology/Obstetrics
• Ophthalmology
• Orthopedics
• Plastics
• Urology

Non-Hospital Surgical Facilities. The Calgary Health Region contracts surgical procedures to accredited non-hospital surgical facilities. Contracts are in place for the following types of procedures:

• Ophthalmology
• Paediatric Dental Surgery
• Oral Maxilla Facial Surgery
• Podiatry
• Orthopedics

Other facilities Surgical procedures are also performed at the Alberta Children's Hospital, the rural facilities (Canmore, High River and Banff) and the Tom Baker Cancer Centre.

Minor Operating Rooms and Surgical Clinics

Minor surgical clinics at the Foothills, Peter Lougheed and Rockyview hospital carry out surgical procedures that can be done under local anaesthetic. Each of these hospitals has two minor operating rooms.

The Rockyview Hospital has the Urology Clinic that provides Cystoscopy, Urodynamic testing and Lithotripsy treatments

Post Anesthetic Care Units (PACU) 

Post anesthetic care units are staffed with nurses with specialized knowledge and skills responsible for managing postoperative emergencies and meeting the needs of the post-anesthetic and post-surgical patient.

• Foothills has 23 PACU beds
• Peter Lougheed has 20 beds and one isolation unit
• Rockyview has 23 beds       

Central Sterile Processing and Case Carts

Central Sterile Processing Department (CSPD) is responsible for the cleaning, disinfection, sterilization of surgical instrumentation and other patient care equipment from other clinical areas and services. The scope of services provided within Sterile Processing includes:

• Soiled receiving
• Disassembly
• Decontamination/Washing
• Cleaning/Assembly
• Sterilization Types – Steam and Ethylene Oxide (ETO), Sterrad and Steris
• Sterile Storage for case cart items
• Case Cart Picking and Storage
• CSPD Administration – human resource and asset management, safety and quality assurance.

Central Sterile Processing departments provide 24 hour a day service, 7 days a week.

Operating Room Information Systems (ORIS)

The Operating Room Information Systems team provides computerized support to the portfolio for:

• wait-listing of surgical cases
• booking and scheduling of surgeries
• maintaining lists of procedures and equipment, and
• producing data that can be used for management of surgical resources.