The first thing Kaiser Permanente members may notice at the new Kona Clinic is the parking situation, which has more space — and spaces — for vehicles.
Located on its own lot mauka of Queen Kaahumanu Highway on Honokohau Street, the road north of Kealakehe Parkway, the clinic has parking all around the health care campus.
More space was a theme as Kaiser’s national officials worked with local staff in planning the new clinic. The pharmacy, in a separate building from the main clinic services, is four to six times the size of the current one, Dr. Rick Fong said during a tour Friday. Next door, the optical center may be even more times larger than the existing space, he said.
Across a small courtyard is the main clinic, with a centralized reception area, a lounge, where a television will eventually be available to entertain members while they wait for prescriptions or other services, and two floors of office space.
Exam rooms at the old clinic on Hualalai Road often left little room for patient and provider to maneuver, particularly when a patient brought a spouse or other companion for support. The new rooms might be double the size, some with larger than standard exam tables to accommodate special needs patients, Fong said.
The new design and extra space will help patients and staff, he added.
“It’s much more efficient,” he said. “It’s so much nicer when we’re all on one floor, rather than going up and down.”
Kaiser began using the Hualalai Road clinic in 1987. It has about 13,000 square feet of space. The new clinic, at 40,000 square feet, more than triples that space.
“Our hope is, because we’re bigger, we’ll do more procedures we would normally fly (members to Oahu to do) and keep them here,” Fong said.
The oncology space at the old clinic can serve three patients at a time. The new one can accommodate four, and provides significantly more space, Fong said. Currently, an oncology pharmacist comes once a week to mix the drug dosages. With the extra work space for oncology, Kaiser may increase those visits to twice weekly.
Still, members will be sent to the Oahu clinic for some services. Hilo members will be asked to drive to Kona for some services, too, Fong said.
The new clinic opens at 1:30 p.m. July 1. Fong said the current office will close at 5 p.m. June 26, giving staff several days to make the move.
Clinic Manager Lloyd Tanaka said staff is already boxing up items. The first load of 120 to 130 boxes was already brought to a storage area near the new site.
“Everything that is not essential, we’re staring to pack,” he said.
Other features at the new clinic include making all four of the pharmacy windows Americans with Disabilities Act accessible, via desks that can lower to accommodate a seated patient or one in a wheelchair, a trellis for plants to grow and create a “green wall” near the external stairwell and Hawaii-themed fabrics on the chairs featuring surfboards and other local images. Even the artwork will be from Hawaii, with all but one of the artists whose work will be displayed coming from Hawaii Island. Just one will be from an Oahu artist, Fong said.
The interior “incorporates a lot of colors,” architect Mike Okamoto added. “You’ll hardly see any white.”
Okamoto said the landscaping will feature plants used in traditional Hawaiian medicines. The plants will be watered with water reclaimed from the property’s on-site wastewater treatment plant. As a building certified to the LEED gold level, it will also have photovoltaic panels for electricity and other energy saving features.