Tauranga Hospital patients awaiting final discharge papers or transport home are going to enjoy the comfort of La-Z-Boys in a new transit lounge being refurbished this week.

Bay of Plenty District Health Board chief operating officer Philip Balmer says the lounge will provide a place for people to go while they are waiting to leave the hospital.

The transit lounge is due to be kitted out with 14 La-Z-Boys. This photo shows the space the new lounge is filling.

He says the hospital needs to look at, and commit to new ways, of doing things to meet the needs of a growing and aging population.

'Tauranga Hospital continues to grow its range and volume of services.

'We therefore need to constantly evaluate how we can improve the way we do things to improve patient care with the resources available.”

Philip says the lounge, which is located on the first floor of Tauranga Hospital, can accommodate up to 20 people in chairs rather than beds, with food and tea/coffee available.

'Family and friends will be notified if their family member has been transferred to the transit lounge.”

He says introducing the transit lounge is a case of doing things differently to meet those growing needs.

'We have a timing issue between the arrival of our patients in the emergency department (ED) and the availability of beds in the hospital.”

Peak ED presentations at Tauranga Hospital occur at 10am while most of the hospital's discharges occur at 3pm.

This means beds are sometimes unavailable for patients to be admitted into in a timely way.

'To address this problem, we are planning to open a transit lounge so beds of those ready to go home but waiting for paperwork or prescriptions, for example, can be freed up much earlier for new patients coming in.”

The new transit lounge will be staffed by a registered nurse and opens today.