Wellness Center is a Welcome Addition in Carlsbad

Medical care has undergone a radical metamorphosis within the last few decades. Health, what once was considered the sole domain of the medical profession, is now widely accepted as a personal responsibility. Along with nutritional choices, exercise programs and healthy lifestyle decisions, medical intervention is viewed more as a collaborative partner in the pursuit of good health.

Enter Tri-City Wellness Center. This newly opened center offers the only health and fitness experience of its kind in San Diego County. Approaching health from a medical perspective, this fitness campus sets the stage for a comprehensive, medically integrated environment focused on total well-being. The center offers personalized health assessments and personal training, in addition to the medical component of cardiac rehabilitation, physical and occupational therapy. Their team of college-degreed and certified specialists, dieticians and health educators work together with members to develop personalized fitness programs with the goal of improving the overall quality of life. This center offers something for everyone from the novice exerciser to the elite athlete. And in the words of Jeff Segall, director of public affairs for Tri-City Medical Center, "This is the most sophisticated center of its kind in all of San Diego."

The 60,000-square-foot Wellness Center offers members a wide variety of exercise options. They can train on state-of-the-art resistance or cardiovascular equipment or with free weights, walk or jog around the cushioned indoor track, or take a class in one of the group exercise studios. They can also choose to make use of one of the three pools in the Aquatic Center—the 25-meter lap pool, exercise pool or the revolutionary new HydroWorx 2000. This unique pool comes complete with a powerful jet system and a variable speed underwater treadmill.

The campus also boasts a tranquil Zen Garden as a sanctuary from the tensions of everyday life, and a Healthy Café that offers a variety of health-wise sandwiches, salads and beverages to bolster a healthy immune system. Other stress-reduction services include massage therapy, as well as separate men's and women's steam and sauna rooms. The center's Kidz in Motion program also offers a safe, secure, supervised environment for children six months through 11 years while their parents are using the center. And if that weren't enough, in order to better equip its members with ongoing health education, the center has a Health Education Conference Center on site (complete with a healthy cooking area) where members can enjoy cooking lessons and workshops. Truly a one-of-a-kind facility, the Tri-City Wellness Center combines medically directed education, exercise and lifestyle improvements to help its members take control of their own health and improve their quality of life.

The Wellness Center may provide an innovative approach to health care, but close proximity hospitals have a long and steady history of healing Carlsbad.

The dictionary defines a hospital as "an institution where people receive medical, surgical or psychiatric treatment and nursing care."

While most of us will agree with this definition, we all attach a different emotion to the word when we hear it. For some it is a positive feeling—hospitals are the places where most often the joy of life begins. For others it elicits a negative feeling—carrying with it memories of illness or tragedy. But there is one emotion we all share about hospitals—we all want a great one near us when we need medical care.

Fortunately for residents living in Carlsbad, there are two hospitals within easy driving distance that serve our community. Tri-City Medical Center, located in Oceanside, serves the North County communities of Carlsbad, Oceanside and Vista. Founded in 1957 to establish a modern, full-service hospital to meet the needs of the area’s growing population, Tri-City Medical Center (TCMC) is dedicated to preserving and enhancing the health of North County residents.

In its ongoing commitment to serve the community’s health needs, last October TCMC celebrated the opening of a fully integrated, digital Cardiovascular Catheterization Laboratory used to prevent and treat potentially fatal cardiac conditions such as heart attacks. Tri-City Medical Center is a San Diego County designated Heart Attack Receiving Center. This means it has an experienced heart attack receiving team and a Cardiac Catheterization Lab available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. This new addition will help with improved imaging, rapid physician access to records and availability of records from multiple locations, all of which results in speedy diagnoses and life-saving treatment for heart patients. While the cardiac team is already exceeding the national averages of door to balloon time (from when the patient enters the hospital to when a blocked artery is opened) by almost 30 percent, this new technology will allow them to respond even more efficiently. According to Dr. David Speigel, medical director of TCMC's Cardiac Catheterization Lab, "With a heart attack, time is muscle—saving time translates to saving as much of the heart muscle as possible."

Tri-City Medical Center is also home to the second busiest Emergency Department (ED) in San Diego County. Treating some 70,000 patients a year, TCMC's ED is the largest in North County with 41 beds. Tri-City's Emergency physicians are specially trained with over 550 years of combined experience and continually strive to improve efficiency, decrease wait times and improve the quality of the health care they provide. One new system that helps with this level of efficiency is the electronic medical records system. This system fully automates and instantly transmits patient records, triage notes, lab results and radiology reports directly to the physicians, providing them more time to focus on patient care. This system is augmented by the use of "Scribes," specially trained pre-med students who follow doctors into patient rooms and electronically take patient notes on a wireless notebook. This computerized physician order entry (CPOE) cuts time, reduces errors and allows everyone involved in patient care to have all the information they need at the same time. According to Dr. Reid Conant, chief medical information officer for Tri-City Emergency Medical Group and an ED physician, "Scribe technology allows us to focus our attention on the patient while the chart is completed in real time. This is cutting-edge stuff."

Tri-City has also added a "Fast-Track" area adjacent to the ED for patients with less acute injuries. This allows doctors to serve these patients in a separate area, helping to cut waiting times for those with more serious illnesses. Along with their hospital-wide flow team that follows patients from door to discharge, TCMC continues to offer North County residents top-notch health care while pursuing their ongoing quest for improving patient care throughout the hospital.

Another hospital serving our community is located right next door in the city of Encinitas. Scripps Memorial Hospital is part of the Scripps Health System, a nonprofit community-based health care delivery network here in San Diego. Currently this network includes five acute-care hospitals on five campuses, more than 2600 affiliated physicians, an extensive outpatient care network and home health care. Scripps has a long history in San Diego, dating back to 1924 when Ellen Browning Scripps founded Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla. Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas joined the Scripps Family in 1978 to serve San Diego County residents living in coastal North County.

Scripps Encinitas has a reputation for providing expert specialty and emergency care in state-of-the-art facilities. Their specialty programs include North County’s first Primary Stroke Center, a regionally recognized brain injury program, a technologically advanced imaging center, 24-hour emergency care and the county’s first World Health Organization baby-friendly birth pavilion. This hospital meets the needs of the surrounding communities with 37,000 emergency department visits annually, more than 3700 surgeries performed each year, 1700 babies born annually and 70,000 patient visits per year. And as if these numbers are not impressive enough, in 2008 Scripps was named to FORTUNE Magazine’s 11th annual list of America’s "100 Best Companies to Work For," ranking 56. This was the first time a San Diego health care provider was included in this list.

In addition to medically meeting the physical needs of its patients, Scripps Encinitas also has some innovative additions to address the needs of the whole person. The courtyard of the campus hosts two "Healing Gardens"—beautifully landscaped garden areas complete with resting areas and the soothing sounds of water falling over rocks into a serene pond. Local garden clubs volunteer their services to maintain these healing gardens and patients love to frequent them for the healing that nature itself provides.

Another wholistic addition to treating the whole person is the “Arts for Healing” Art Gallery. Artists display their works in the hallways surrounding the healing garden for patients’ viewing pleasure. Founded by artist Gerrit Greve in 2003, the art that hangs in the gallery is provided by different artists and is rotated every one to two months. All artistic pieces must meet the hospital guidelines and themes associated with aiding the process of healing, and each piece is available for sale. A portion of the sales goes to support the financial needs of the hospital through the Scripps Encinitas Foundation.

In looking to the future needs of the growing communities it serves, Scripps Encinitas is planning a $200 million, multi-phase development plan to expand the hospital. This expansion will include the addition of an 883-stall parking structure and a new two-story critical care building to house a 24-bed emergency department and 36 acute care beds. A new three-story acute care building will also provide 20 ICU and 30 medical-surgical beds to expand in-patient capacity. The existing hospital will also undergo a $15 million upgrade and retrofitting to meet state-mandated seismic standards. And a new 68,000-square-foot medical office building will be built to house physician offices to allow for close proximity to their patients in need of hospital care.

Its good to know that outstanding medical care is available to our community from two hospitals committed to providing that care. Whether Tri-City Medical Center or Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas, we can rest easy knowing that we have access to top-notch physicians and state-of-the-art medical facilities. Thanks to the dedicated health professionals at both places, we can have our health needs met 24 hours a day, seven days a week. •