BARRY WILLIAMS/ Special

Margie Hunter, director of women and infants services at the new women's center at DeKalb Medical Center, helped design the facility.

Margie K. Hunter jokes that she must have missed the class on building women's centers when she was in nursing school. That hasn't stopped her from grabbing a blueprint and applying her vision to the new $55 million women's center at DeKalb Medical Center in Decatur, which opened last month.

Hunter knew what she was getting into when she took the job as director of women and infants services at DeKalb Medical Center four years ago.

"I knew this project was on the books and welcomed it, since I had done something similar at Southern Regional [Medical Center in Riverdale] from 1999 to 2001," she said. "Nursing duties have a way of expanding, and you never know what you'll be called on to do, but I love it."

DeKalb Medical officials knew that the facility needed to expand and upgrade its women's and surgical facilities to meet the county's growth and to compete with newer women's services centers in metro Atlanta.

The new, five-story building sits atop three stories of underground parking and includes a soaring atrium/lobby; 18 spacious labor, delivery and recovery suites (complete with CD/DVD players and refrigerators); eight private family waiting alcoves; 62 private mother/baby postpartum rooms; and a neonatal intensive care unit; and surgical units equipped with state-of-the-art technology, including computer-guided navigation for neurosurgery, orthopedics and ENT procedures. There's also ample space for consultations and education, including classrooms and a 100-seat auditorium. The building has a bistro-style restaurant, a lactation center and a retail store for breastfeeding mothers.

"The whole model was developed around evidence-based, family-centered care, and my vision was to make it comfortable and welcoming, not sterile," Hunter said. The lobby includes stacked-fireplaces, plenty of natural light, a garden, Mission-style architectural accents and warm colors.

"My team worked with the interior designer to pull out natural, organic elements that would create a relaxed, spa-type atmosphere," Hunter said.

Wanting the hospital to be a natural reflection of its community, DeKalb Medical Center commissioned local artists to design works for the new building, including sculptor Alexander Zielinski's cascading abstract flock of birds in glass, beads, copper and brass in the lobby, and Dr. Jerome Walker's photographs of American wilderness areas. Hunter plans to create a brochure that will give patients and their families a walking tour of the building's art.

Beyond aesthetics, Hunter and her team knew the facility had to work for patients and employees.

"It's important to have nurses' and staff input in the design, because they are the experts who understand the flow of the hospital and the needs of the patients. They're looking at the productivity of the staff," Hunter said. "Sometimes you have to be assertive with architects, because a lot of productivity has to do with geography."

A well-designed building improves efficiency, and Hunter commends everyone who tweaked, suggested and persevered to get the vision right. "This building is the representation of a lot of teamwork," Hunter said.

Her staff not only held focus groups to get opinions on colors, tile and wood elements but also created full-scale mock-ups of labor and delivery rooms and mother/baby rooms so that staff, administrators and future patients could see what was planned and make suggestions. "We simulated a high-risk delivery, because the physicians wanted to see how the space worked for all the physicians and staff who would need to be there," she said.

Among the innovations and efficiencies: The well-baby nursery and mother/baby nursing station are placed back-to-back so that the two can share staff and resources. The triage and recovery rooms have a combined nursing station, so that, if there is low bed count in the recovery room, a triage nurse could fill in as the second nurse on duty.

To keep the activity of the nursing station shielded from some parts of the facility, it's nearly enclosed, leaving the hallways more open.

"The well-baby nursery is in a corridor that doesn't face patient rooms. Families who are excited and celebrating shouldn't be interfering with patients trying to get their rest," Hunter said.

Hunter is excited about and proud of the new facility but hopes to get back to nursing once the bugs are ironed out.

"This project was one of the reasons I came here," she said. "I've lived in DeKalb County for 40 years. I delivered my first child here and have deep roots in this community. This was my first opportunity to give something back."