University of Miami Hospital is undergoing some repairs amid concerns of mold after a sprinkler burst flooded a handful of operating rooms, hospital officials said.
"About a month ago, a sprinkler broke open in one of the operating rooms late in the evening," said UM's Chief Medical Officer, Dr. William O'Neill. "It took us about half an hour to get there to close and find out to make sure that there wasn't a fire and during that time, all of the ORs really got heavily damaged. In the core, there was about four that got extensive water damage."
As of now, 12 of the 20 ORs are not available for use, forcing UM on some occasions to move patients to surgical facilities across the street, at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center.
The ongoing repairs involve removing some walls and checking for any sign of mold, which so far, hasn't been found.
"There's probably some small amount of mold, anywhere in South Florida there's mold, If you leave it alone," said O'Neill. "We've done extensive testing with our own infectious disease people, there's absolutely no proof that there's anything in the air or anything that would be a patient safety concern."
A spokesman from the Agency for Healthcare Administration said they weren't involved in the UM OR closings, but should have been notified if there was a problem with water damage or mold.
O'Neill said it's not as serious as it sounds.
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"It's just the repair of a facility, and really, we haven't felt that ACHA needed to involved with this at all," he said.
O'Neill said it'll take six weeks for the repairs to be completed.
