BANGOR – Officials from Eastern Maine Medical Center cut the ribbon Wednesday on a new 12-bed intensive care unit, bringing to 44 the total number of critical care beds at the hospital.

The new unit is located on the hospital’s first floor, not far from the main entrance. Each of the 12 rooms offers at least a glimpse of the Penobscot River, and several provide sweeping views of the water. The rooms are more spacious than those in the older ICU, with enough space for a patient bed, a battery of high-tech medical monitors and other devices, and a cadre of health care staff and family members.

Each room also provides an armchair that converts to a bed for an overnighting family member, as well as an adjoining half-bath. Several meeting rooms and waiting areas offer privacy and confidentiality for families coping with a loved one in medical crisis.

The ICU project, which involved relocating several other offices and services, cost the hospital $4.6 million and required approval from the state’s Certificate of Need office.

As the destination hospital for the region’s sickest and most gravely injured patients, EMMC has been challenged in recent years to provide enough ICU beds, said Deborah Carey Johnson, the hospital’s president and chief executive officer. Over the past decade, she said, the demand for ICU services has increased significantly, in part because a dozen small community hospitals in the northern half of the state no longer have intensive care units of their own. Maine’s aging population, the emergence of new medical technologies and the growth of the LifeFlight emergency transport helicopter have further strained EMMC’s critical facilities, she said.

For several years, the hospital has extended its ICU and cardiac care services to overflow “satellite” units on the fourth and fifth floors of the Grant building. While that has taken some pressure off the primary ICU, Johnson said it also has decreased the number of medical-surgical beds available. Staffing the far-flung units also has been a challenge, she added. With the opening of the new ICU, one of the upper-floor units will continue in critical-care use, while the other will now revert to more general use – though it can be called back into ICU service if needed.

Johnson, a registered nurse who began her career at EMMC 33 years ago, recalled coming to work at what is now considered the “old” ICU but which at the time was a new, state-of-the-art facility. The unit she opened on Wednesday, she said, is “one stepping stone down the path” toward fulfilling the hospital’s commitment to meeting the health care needs of the northern half of the state.

EMMC is in the process of planning a major expansion and renovation at its State Street campus.

Also speaking at Wednesday’s Open House was Jack Quirk Jr., whose 24-year-old son, Joe, was critically injured last year in a motorcycle accident. Quirk recalled with emotion the long weeks he and other family members spent in the ICU as they waited to see whether Joe would survive. Jack Quirk had high praise for the physicians, nurses and other staff who saved his son’s life. Joe Quirk is now fully recovered, his father said.

“The most important asset in this community is the people who work in this building and get the job done,” he said. “Obviously, we hope we never have to go through it again, but if we do, this is the place to be if you’re hurt or sick.”

About 60 doctors, nurses, administrators, board members and other members of the community attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony.