Patients at BryanLGH Medical Center West began migrating south a few weeks ago, venturing into unfamiliar habitat — at least for this hospital.

The new landscape features expansive all-private rooms with comfortable furniture for visitors, flat-screen televisions and adequate shelving for cards or flowers.

When the last of the open-back frocks depart the 1960s-era rooms, renovation here will enter its final stages.

“We’re calling this Lincoln’s newest hospital,” said Lynn Wilson, president of BryanLGH Medical System, strolling the newly opened gray and purple concourse that runs the front of BryanLGH West.

When completed next year, only the concrete bones of the former Lincoln General Hospital will remain. Workers will have replaced everything else, the internal walls, plumbing and heating and all mechanical operations.

For BryanLGH management, it’s a promise fulfilled.

The $123,225,000 project was begun in 2000, three years after Lincoln General Hospital was purchased from the city for a third of that cost. The transaction occurred amid heated debate.

In the merger, people were personally hurt, hospital spokeswoman Suzanne McMasters said.

“With this building,” she said, “we’ve done what we said we were going to do.”

At the time of the merger, an expanding Bryan Memorial Hospital  — pushed by a thriving heart-care program — was desperate for space.

Since then, the combined BryanLGH organization has been confronted by new competitors as well as the challenges of melding two hospital cultures.

On Wednesday, hospital administrators announced they had cut the equivalent of 41 full-time positions, completing an organizational contraction of nearly 10 percent over the past two years. About 4,000 employees now work on both campuses.

Wilson said there were no plans to put hospital construction on hold. Modernization is an essential part of staying competitive.

Nowhere is that more true than at BryanLGH West.

Wilson knows that some people will continue to call this campus Lincoln General, even if the old hospital is unrecognizable within it.

Today, the gaudy, red 1970s-style carpeting of the old cafeteria can be seen only in select scenes from “Terms of Endearment,” filmed there in 1983.

People always had good things to say about the care provided at BryanLGH West, Wilson said, but often they complained about how the facilities looked.

“Now,” he said, “there’s been a 180-degree turn.”

Patients, physicians and staff marvel at the transformation, he said.

“It’s so quiet, so restful,” said Monica Burklund, neurospine manager, poking her head into a newly readied patient room. “That’s the part you really notice,” she said.

Lincoln has experienced plenty of hospital renovations, especially of late, but none nears this jump between different health-care eras.

The new rooms are bigger, and each has its own shower. There is more comfort and convenience. There are more windows.

The more-more-more phenomenon extends throughout.

By contrast, the older two-patient rooms — called semi-private by means of paper-thin curtains pulled between the beds — had tiny bathrooms and little or no space for visitors. Patients showered in tiny, shared pods out in the hall.

Brenda Lieske, intensive care unit nurse manager, has worked in the building for 27 years. Throughout the old facility, she said,  the outdated design created issues of privacy, safety and security, in addition to general discomfort.

“In summer, they couldn’t regulate the temperature adequately,” she said.

A relic like that isn’t likely to thrive in a modern medical market, with modern medical prices.

Last year, BryanLGH lost some of its baby business after Saint Elizabeth Regional Medical Center opened new birthing areas featuring all-private rooms, Wilson said. He expects that business will return when a tower dedicated to women and children opens at BryanLGH East. At BryanLGH West, only recently have the benefits of reconstruction begun to outweigh the pains.

In many ways, the new Bryan-LGH West complements its twin at BryanLGH East.

From day one of the merger, Wilson said, the goal was to consolidate services rather than duplicate them.

Finally, renovation has reached a point where consolidation and efficiency can be readily achieved.

“Now, things are opening up,” Wilson said.

At BryanLGH East, renovations will be finished in 2008.

Although construction isn’t complete at BryanLGH West, visitors and patients are increasingly directed into finished areas.

The hospital concourse opened two months ago, although workers have yet to complete the coffee shop, featuring wireless Internet.

Within two months, the day-care building at the front of the Bryan-LGH West building will be removed.

The construction crane located south of BryanLGH West will leave soon. The crane on the north side will stay a year longer, said Dave Reese, hospital special projects director.

It takes a tour of the hospital to see how much has changed.

New patient rooms have curved architectural aspects that add interest. Curves exist in the fixtures, floors and ceilings.

All rooms feature Internet connections.

“It’s a way to connect with family and business,” Lieske said.

Room televisions “have every channel that the Huskers have ever been on,” Wilson added. Over the years, that’s been one of the biggest complaints.

Modernization reaches even to the beds, which weigh the patient, equalize surface pressure to reduce bedsores and notify nurses at the front desk when rails are lowered.

“One of biggest issues in hospitals today are falls,” Wilson said.

Down in the surgical areas, manager Julie Kelley shows off the shiny, ceramic walls inlaid with colorful designs.

The bright atmosphere is a departure from the gloom of the past. “Physicians had asked for it,” she said.

Most noticeable are the wide-open spaces.

The smallest operating room at the old West was 370 square feet. The largest was 480.

Now, the smallest will be 600 square feet and the largest 900 — bigger than some Lincoln homes.

Size matters, but so does the filtered green light that will allow physicians to see better during laparascopic procedures. So does the prism lighting that eliminates shadows. So does having all equipment on booms suspended from the ceiling.

There are flat-screen plasma monitors for colorful closeups of the current procedure. There are high-quality stereos where surgeons can connect their I-pods full of favorite tunes.

Other features include controlled airflow and special in-wall cabinets for warming blankets.

“This is set up for the future,” Kelley said. “Whatever comes out, we’re ready for it.”

Teams of physicians, hospital management and staff spent a year on the design, Wilson said.

“You could not go anywhere in the country and find operating rooms more sophisticated,” he said.

As part of the renovation, the hospital in August announced the creation of the Louis J. Gogela Sr. Institute of Neuroscience at Bryan-LGH West.

The institute will elevate the sophisticated subspecialty to a higher standard, relying on world-class technology and staff, Wilson said.

The neuroscience center will replicate in neuroscience what BryanLGH did initially with hearts, tracking outcomes to work toward achieving results equal to those of the Mayo Clinic, Wilson said.

Summing it up, he added, “We want to be the cutting edge.”

Changes to BryanLGH West 2004/2005

Opened May 2004

* Outpatient surgery

* Mental health services

* Emergency/trauma (Phase I)

* Will be the largest emergency department in the state when Phase II opens this winter, with 35 exam rooms and four trauma resuscitation rooms

* Education department/conference center

Opened summer 2005

* Acute inpatient rehabilitation on 3 South — 20 beds

* Ortho/trauma on 4 South — 24 beds

* Med/surg on 5 South — 24 beds

* Pedestrian concourse

Open September 2005

* Neuro and progressive care on 6 South — 24 beds

* Five new surgery suites on first floor, including specialized rooms for trauma and neurosurgery (12 surgery rooms will open when completed)

* Sleep center on 6 Northeast

* Oncology on 7 South

Opening fall 2005   

* Intensive care on 2 South

* Pre-surgery and post-anesthesia care units

* Cafe Express

* Community health education and resource center in the new pedestrian concourse

Construction continues:

* Remainder of north tower units

* Seven additional surgery suites

* Third patient elevator

* New gift shop

* New lab

* Radiology renovation

West by the numbers

As of Aug. 1, the construction project at BryanLGH West has included:

* 408,000 feet or 77 miles of conduit.

* 1,506,000 feet or 285 miles of wire.

* 18 miles of copper pipe, three miles of cast-iron pipe and 8,000 feet of steel-welded pipe.

* 3,370 light fixtures.

* 2,804 switches.

* 3,400 receptacles.

* 68 tons of sheet metal.

* 150 toilets.

Source: Kidwell Electric Company Inc., The Waldinger Corp.

Reach Mark Andersen at 473-7238 or mandersen@journalstar.com.