Windsor Regional Hospital celebrated the completion of its expanded cardiac catheterization lab on Monday, June 29, 2026, marking what officials call an important milestone in local critical-care treatment for heart attack patients. The renovation of 17,000 square feet of space at the downtown Ouellette campus and the addition of a second catheterization table follows a $30-million investment by the province in 2023.
Ending costly patient transfers to Detroit
Hospital officials say the new cath lab will save taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars each year by nearly eliminating the need to transport patients across the border for the life-saving procedure. Prior to the expansion, WRH was the only hospital in Ontario with a cardiac catheterization program using just one table, sending an average of one patient per month to Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit at a cost between $43,000 and $75,000 USD per procedure. Additional interventions could increase costs up to $187,000 USD per patient.
“This is an important milestone in the history of the government’s commitment to patient care in Windsor and Essex County,” WRH president and CEO Kristin Kennedy said in a press release. “We thank the Ford government for investing in this necessary and long-awaited project which will save the lives of more cardiac patients in our region, and save on the costs to send patients to Detroit when they couldn’t be accommodated here.”
Expansion details and community support
The first cardiac catheterization table became operational in 1997 in the basement of the Ouellette Campus facility. The current expansion moved the lab to the second floor, closer to the Emergency Department and Cardiac Care Unit, improving efficiency and ease for staff. The larger space and 24-hour service mean WRH can complete more vital cardiac procedures and reduce wait times for both urgent and elective procedures. The cath lab is expected to see its first patient next week.
An additional $7 million in donations raised in the community covered the local share needed to expand the cath lab and to purchase a state-of-the-art Hemo Cardiovascular Information System. “Thanks to our dedicated community, we are proud to fund the local share to expand our critical cath lab services,” said Cristina Naccarato, executive director of the Windsor Regional Hospital Foundation, in a press release. “This expansion addresses an urgent healthcare need in our region. Our donors saw that gap and rallied together to close it.”
What is cardiac catheterization?
According to a Windsor Regional Hospital press release, life-saving cardiac catheterization involves a small, minimally invasive incision into an artery through the arm or groin that allows the threading of a catheter through the artery to the heart. This allows clinicians to perform a percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) such as coronary angioplasty to open up narrowed or blocked segments of a coronary artery for both emergency patients and scheduled procedures. It is also used as a diagnostic tool to identify specific heart vessel issues.
