St. Charles Bend Expands – New Patient Tower to be Built

Bend, Ore. – St. Charles Bend embarks on a new $66 million project. A new patient tower will be built on its northeast campus.

The large construction undertaking will double its number of intensive care unit beds by 2018, and reduce the need to send patients to Portland instead.

According to Bob Gomes, CEO of St. Charles Bend and Redmond, with the growth of Central Oregon and an expansion into more complex surgeries at the hospital, the current facility is consistently facing capacity issues for both critical and inpatient beds.

The new tower will almost double the critical care capacity to between 32 and 36 beds.

The new facility will also require additional staffing. CEO Gomes said the hospital plans to hire 30 to 40 additional nurses and a handful of new physicians to meet the demand.

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Bingo with Bren Supporting Locavore

Who’s ready for a beer? Central Oregon Locavore is thrilled to be the beneficiary of Bevel Craft Brewing’s Bingo with Bren every Monday this January (except the 27th)! Join us there from 6-8pm, grab a Bingo card

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Local Firefighters Sent To California

The Oregon State Fire Marshal is mobilizing three more structural strike teams to southern California from the Oregon fire service. The teams will join 12 strike teams that were sent Wednesday morning. The strike teams are from

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Oregon Child Care Funding Requested

Nearly 9,000 families are on the wait list for the Oregon Employment Related Day Care program, and family advocates are calling on lawmakers to ramp up funding to meet the growing need. Child-care prices in Oregon can

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Deschutes County Releases Wildfire Protection Plan

The Upper Deschutes River Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) is available for public feedback through February 5. The community is encouraged to review the draft plan and provide their feedback by visiting www.deschutes.org/forester. CWPP’s help communities like Deschutes