Public can tour Carson Tahoe Regional Medical Center for the first time

After more than two years under construction, the doors of the Carson Tahoe Regional Medical Center will open to the public for the first time Saturday.

Visitors can wander the halls with maps, peek into maple-furnished private rooms and navigate the new cardiovascular unit. Visitors have from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. to explore the hospital's three main floors.

The community preview event is three weeks before the 352,000-square-foot hospital opens for patients Dec. 3.

Medical center spokeswoman Cheri Glockner said Monday the preview could attract thousands who are interested in understanding the hospital before they need to use it.

"This does seem like a long time coming," she said. "So we're excited for the community to get a peek in it."

Visitors can enter the hospital from the main entrance off Medical Parkway, on the east side of the building, or the emergency entrance, on the west side of the building. Both entrances are accessible from the Medical Parkway loop off North Carson Street.

"We are going to have parking available all around building. Security will help visitors find a parking place on Medical Parkway if the lot is full."

Tours are self-guided, but staff will be in the building to explain department functions or help those who are lost. U.S. Food Service is providing samples of the food that patients can expect to have at the new hospital. Medical equipment vendors will be set up inside the imaging and surgery departments.

The 85-acre campus has 138 private patient rooms with sleeping space for relatives, wireless Internet access, large bathrooms and windows.

Hospital executives have eagerly touted one new feature of the hospital: its views over Eagle Valley. The hospital is moving from 775 Fleischmann Way, where it has operated for 55 years.

"This is a dream realized," said hospital Chief Executive Officer Ed Epperson. " We feel really good about promising our community that we would first privatize to a private nonprofit, rather than a county-owned facility. The major reason we needed to do that was so that we could move forward with a new medical center as we promised, with no tax dollars involved, no risk to the community members. At the same time we delivered a truly state-of-the-art medical center for the region."

The $132 million for the medical center and Sierra Surgery & Imaging, which opened in April, was privately raised.

Workers will soon break ground on the 40,000-square-foot medical office building on the west side of the surgery center, Epperson said. Work will not begin on the eastside medical office building until tenants are secured. Construction on the Carson-Tahoe Cancer Center infrastructure and foundation has begun.

The 38,000 square-foot cancer center is located on the northwest corner of the medical center campus. It's expected to open in 2006.

n Contact reporter Becky Bosshart at bbosshart@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1212.

If you go

What: Carson Tahoe Regional Medical Center ribbon-cutting ceremony and community preview

When: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday; 10:30 a.m. ribbon-cutting

Where: 1600 Medical Parkway; the ribbon cutting is in the second-floor reading room