Remodel And Expansion Advice From Dr. Toy

If you're considering a remodel, I would say, don't make the mistake like I did, saying that, oh, I'm never going to do that procedure, so I don't need to worry about that. I don't need to plan for that, because things do change. We knew it was the right time to expand when we simply could not fit any more patients into the schedule, especially an emergency. The space next door to ours became available. Timing wise, when it comes along, you have to nab it because you don't know when it's going to be available again. My biggest concern for our remodel was how we would be able to continue to work while the remodel was going on, and we were really fortunate in that our builder had some really good ideas on how to isolate the new space from the existing space. During the remodel, of course, you know, you're working with patients and it's pretty noisy, and you have to warn people that all of a sudden there's going to be a really loud noise, and it's not us. It's not us working on a patient. And yeah, it, it didn't look pretty. There are some days it was pretty dusty, but again, the construction crew is just really good about managing that.

You really have to think about continuity from your current space to the new space, but also learn from your experience in your current space, like really look at the things that work well, the layouts that work well for you, the equipment that works well for you, but also think about future proofing the space as well and build into your new plans. What do you want for yourself in five years or in 10 years? Oftentimes an expansion can be almost as expensive as the original build-out because you're trying to meld the original space into a new space, and as you're looking at the dollars adding up, it can be really easy to start cutting things off, but what I've experienced is later on trying to add it back, it's a lot more expensive than if you just went with it originally. There are some things that are just worth doing. It seems very overwhelming at first, but just know that trying to retrofit something or correct it later on is often a lot more expensive. I like it so much better. There's just a feel to it that I just prefer to be in that room working with that equipment. I definitely can feel the difference in how fatigued I am by the end of the appointment, working in one room versus the other. The remodel actually went a lot better than I thought it would.