Heart of the North: Strengthening Cardiac Care at UHNBC Today and for the Future

The UHNBC Acute Care Tower is a major investment to bring specialized heart services closer to home, so patients across the North can access life-saving care in Prince George.

This expansion isn’t just about new equipment. It’s about delivering faster care, improving outcomes, and helping families stay together throughout every step of the journey.

Built for the North, Designed for Healing

We're expanding cardiac care to meet the needs of our region. The UHNBC Acute Care Tower will have:

6 new cardiac care beds: For patients who need close monitoring and specialized treatment.

20 new cardiac step-down beds: Supporting recovery and healing after cardiac events and procedures.

New cardiac clinics, procedure rooms, and diagnostic services: Offering comprehensive care, from diagnostic to recovery.

2 new cardiac catheterization labs (cath labs): These labs will allow for real-time diagnostics and life-saving interventions.

Behind these new services is a team already laying the groundwork, including nurses like Jennifer Krzyczkowski, who are helping shape the future of cardiac care in the North.

Why Local Cardiac Care Matters

When Jennifer Krzyczkowski, known to her colleagues and patients as Jen K, relocated from the Lower Mainland to Prince George during the pandemic, she brought with her more than two decades of experience in acute cardiac care and a master’s degree in nursing. What she didn’t expect was to find herself at the heart of a transformative movement in northern health care.

“I initially came to work in palliative care and I enjoyed the work and the team” Jen recalls, “but when I heard about the Acute Care Tower project, I knew I had to be part of it. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to help shape the future of cardiac care in the North.”

Now the Nursing Educator for the Cardiac Care Unit at UHNBC, Jen and her team have become a driving force behind the development of a specialized cardiac nursing education program. The Northern Health Cardiac Education Program, which she helped create, has already trained its first cohort of nurses, seven highly skilled professionals who are now delivering cardiac care right here in Prince George.

“This program is about more than just education,” Jen explains. “It’s about building a team and a workplace that people want to be part of. We’re recruiting from across the country, and we’re creating a standard of care that compares to what you’d find in major urban centres.”

But the need is still great.

Currently, patients experiencing cardiac events in the North often have to be flown to Vancouver or other southern centres for life-saving procedures. This delay can be stressful, not just medically, but emotionally and financially for families.

“I’ve seen what it’s like for patients to be separated from their loved ones during the scariest moments of their lives,” Jen says. “Here in the North, we treat heart attacks with clot-busting medications, thrombolytics, which, while highly effective, are no longer the gold standard. The best outcomes come from immediate access to a cardiac catheterization lab (also known as a ‘cath lab’), where we can diagnose and intervene immediately. That’s what we'll have with the new Acute Care Tower.”

The future cath lab will be a game changer. It will allow for real-time diagnostics and interventional procedures that will keep people close to home. And thanks to Jen’s leadership, the nursing team will be ready.

“We’re not just preparing for a new building,” she says. “We’re preparing for a new era in cardiac care for the North.”

With the CCU team already trained and delivering care, the foundation is in place, and the future is within reach.

From left to right: CC, Adelaide, Maria, Neha, and Matilda, dedicated Cardiac Care Unit (CCU) nurses at UHNBC. Their work is supported by equipment generously donated by Spirit of the North.