SOLEDAD — Soledad Medical Clinic has expanded its building, incorporated murals in patient rooms and updated storage facilities.
“We see about 225 patients a day, which is about 3,700 patient visits a year,” said Steve Pritt, chief executive officer for Soledad Health Care District. “We actually have 8,800 patients registered in the clinic.”
Under the Community Block Grant between the Soledad Health Care District and the City, the Soledad Medical Clinic was able to add 800 square feet in the waiting room.
“We did some things on the inside of the clinic that reflect our personality as a medical group,” said Pritt. “We have a new triage room, a new laboratory, and new restrooms.”
The entrance to the Medical Clinic got a makeover as well with landscaping flowers, a ramp for wheelchair access and two benches if patients want to wait outside versus in the waiting room.
The Clinic gained three exam rooms that have multi-functions as exam and triage rooms. In order to have more rooms to see patients, offices for billing and medical staff were repurposed into exam and patient rooms.
Soledad Medical Clinic is also the only rural medical clinic in the state of California that has its own in-house X-ray, according to Pritt. The walls are lined with lead in order to make X-rays safe.
The X-ray machine is digital from Samsung and will come up in three seconds transmitting to Salinas, and the Soledad doctors can also look at the X-ray images.
“We do a lot of vaccinations and immunizations here because all of the kids need their shots,” said Pritt.
Soledad Medical Clinic has storage and refrigerators for those immunizations and was able to pay for laboratory-level refrigerators with a grant from the Harden Foundation and the Foundation for Monterey Peninsula.
Ultrasounds can also be taken at the Medical Clinic at 600 Main St.
