Nancy Haley, a senior staff nurse at UPMC Passavant-Cranberry hospital, gets one of the new pediatric rooms in the emergency department ready for an open house Wednesday. Pediatric physicians from Children's Hospital began practicing at the Cranberry Township hospital on Sept. 2.

CRANBERRY TWP — To complement its renovated emergency department, UPMC Passavant-Cranberry hospital is working with Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh to offer pediatric emergency services.

An open house Wednesday celebrated the coordination.

Pediatric physicians began practicing at Passavant Cranberry on Sept. 2.

The $9 million emergency department renovation was completed in March, said Robert Henderson, Passavant spokesman.

The hospital treats 20,000 patients each year, with 25 percent being pediatric, he said. With the emergency department expansion, the Cranberry facility will be able to treat 40,000 patients per year, he said.

The project expanded the department from 12 to 22 beds, said Gretchen Baysek, a department nurse. Five of those beds are for pediatric patients, and two more can switch from adult to pediatric if needed, she said.

A Children's Hospital physician is on staff at Passavant-Cranberry from 1 to 10 p.m. each day and one nurse out of six is dedicated to the pediatric section between 11 a.m. and 11 p.m., Baysek said.

"Everyone really works together to make it work," she said.

Each room is equipped with a flat screen television to entertain young patients. Each room also has a children's theme, like Winnie the Pooh and Dora the Explorer.

Children who require hospital admission will be sent to Children's Hospital, Baysek said.

The expansion also provided the department easy access to diagnostic testing rooms and more office and storage space, she said.

"After being squashed for so long and trying to accommodate so many people, this is awesome," she said.

Dr. Ravi Vajjhala, emergency department director, said the expansion was necessary to increase bed capacity and replace antiquated equipment.

At the same time, Children's Hospital was looking to expand its urgent care services in the North Hills, said Dr. Richard Saladino, chief of the pediatric emergency medicine division at Children's.

Both hospitals were looking for opportunities to learn from each other, Saladino said.

"That leads to the enhancement of care of kids at this site," he said.

The pediatric emergency services also will relieve the growing volume of patients arriving at Children's Hospital every day, Vajjhala said.

"We foresee as word gets out and as larger volumes of patients come in it will be truly beneficial to the community," he said