Virginia Hospital Center

Not that I’ve been in a lot of hospitals but… this is by far one of the best hospitals I’ve ever been in. The staff is extremely courteous and willing to go out of their way to make you feel comfortable. It doesn’t feel like the traditional hospital with the institutionalized feeling, but rather you can tell that the designer of this hospital (or whoever is in charge of decorations /​ambiance) are looking for an alternative to other hospitals.
The center is huge, with three major wings with two having their own parking lots. Parking over 30 minutes will cost $ 5. There are some food options inside (I saw a subway along side the cafeteria), shops, and a massage parlor. Only disappointment is that I pay more to park at healthcare facility than at the mall.

Most of my doctors are located at Virginia Hospital and I’ve experienced several visits to the ER. The ER triage usually moves pretty fast and the doctors are always knowledgeable, professional and caring. My GYN and family practice doctor located at Virginia Hospital are fantastic! I’m from NY so I certainly don’t mind paying $ 5.00 for parking — what a bargain!
My biggest concern is that several doctors are leaving Virginia Hospital. I wonder why? Does anyone have the scoop on the turnover of doctors taking place this year and next year?

This is by far the WORST hospital that we went through. Had to drive my wife to ER because she is bleeding badly and might have a miscarriage. Waited for 20 minutes after triage to be escorted to an ER room, there we waited for another 40 minutes before a doctor arrived and check my wife. Then another 20 minutes for a lab technician for her to draw a blood. And another 1 hour to ultrasound. We spent for more than 5 hours on this hellish hospital and they didnt even do anything to stop the bleeding!!! Fuck this hospital!!!

Do not take your sick child there. The doctors are great but the nurses and techs weren’t very professional. They stuck my baby several times with no success, it was obvious the nurse has no pediatric experience. The nurse was incredibly young and not very knowledgeable. My mother who came with me is a ICU nurse and was appalled, not to mention both the nurse and tech in the ER had «hickies», that was very tacky along with the conversations we heard between the staff.

The hospital itself is very clean, bright and open. The doctors are friendly, the staff not as much. The parking is paid (including street parking) so make sure you plan for that in your budget and schedule.
There are several buildings in the complex, not all of which are related to the hospital itself. Some of them are a little dilapidated but the hospital is great.

Ok, I truly love you Virginia Hospital Center BUT:
— Parking should be free on weekends and holidays (it is $ 5 all the time)
— Starbucks in 1625 does not accept the Starbucks Reward card (hey, I got a lolly as a child and now I want my Starbucks for a successful doctors appointment)
— Starbucks in 1625 does not serve Teavana Tea, but rather the older Tazo. You can’t trap us in the building with appointments and not expect us to notice life isn’t as good inside the compound.
— The bathrooms are always marginally clean. It sucks as I know it is a hospital facility and puke and poop happen, but they truly need more routine review. I’m fortunate in that I go to the doctor when I am well, so if I go in there and discover a visible mess, I can only imagine what mess is already in my nasal cavity and lungs. Ugh.
Ok, so what do I like? Convenience of getting all my appointments done in a half day. I like the water feature near the radiology department, the free WiFi and the friendly staff. Truthfully, it isn’t fair for me to give a low rating for messy bathrooms and Starbucks, but I know I can go to Joseph Siewick Drive INOVA and use clean restrooms with abundant free parking.

Kaiser Permanente floor within the hospital is a night mare. I am day 2 postoperative abdominal surgery and pain management really dropped the ball in the off hours. Staff talking in the hallway at night complaining to each other about their patients!
Show some compassion, I doubt any of your patients want to be here in the first place! I don’t know about any of the other parts of the hospital. Just wanted to add that OR staff was caring and attentive. I will terminating this Kaiser plan ASAP!

This is a review of phone customer service I received from the Emergency Room Registration office.
I did not want to spend my Friday evening looking for an ER that took my insurance, but after trying to open a bag of chocolate chips with a knife because I was too lazy to look for scissors (please tell me I’m not the only one this has happened to), I found myself calling Virginia Hospital Center and getting re-​routed to several different offices before arriving at ER Registration (the people I was told would verify my insurance). I do not know what the practice is at ERs around the area as I have not been in this situation many times… all I know is that I was told this office would be able to tell me if the hospital accepted my insurance and, when I was finally connected with a very sweet-​sounding young lady, I was told the office could not give me that information. I was «welcome to come in and be treated» without knowing anything about what the visit would end up costing me. Because I’d already been given this run-​around by several other medical facilities by phone that night and my head was starting to ask questions about whether it was possible to bleed out through your finger, I had pretty much resigned myself to just showing up there and seeing how it went. However, when I inquired about whether I could see a simple general list of insurances accepted by the hospital, I was put on hold by the young lady, so that she could check for me. 15 minutes went by… surely someone could pick up soon. After all, this is ER registration and people generally call when they have emergencies. After 30 minutes went by (I will say their hold music was very soothing), I began to suspect I was either forgotten about or put on hold so that I would hopefully eventually hang up. I resolved to not hang up. By the time 40 minutes went by, I had already checked out Target’s first aid supplies inventory and decided to Macgyver my wound. At 40 minutes, I had to hang up (checking out at Target), but decided to call back after. A very nice lady picked up who promptly answered my question about whether or not the hospital would be able to take my insurance. I inquired about the young lady I had spoken to earlier: «Oh, [insert young girl’s name that I don’t want to say because I’m sure it’s possible I was just forgotten about and not ignored]?» the lady answered. «She was trying to find out the answer for you, but then she went on break. And when she came back she was so sad that you had hung up.» REALLY? You don’t leave someone on hold for 40 minutes when you don’t know what kind of emergency situation they are dealing with. You don’t leave someone on hold for 40 minutes in general, but definitely not when they’re calling the ER at night. I understand that there is no «health insurance conversation» that is fun to have. And I totally get that you have a policy you have to abide to. I’m a big girl and can take an answer that is given, and I know you have no logical reasoning for it whatsoever, but I understand managed care is anything but logical. I cannot accept leaving me on hold for 40 minutes and pretending like if I had waited on the phone for the 41^st minute, I would have received an answer. Just tell me I’ll have better luck Macgyvering my hand back together!
P. S. I’m hoping for a full recovery, but I can at least wait until tomorrow and get seen at a different hospital.

The CT/​MRI department of Virginia Hospital Center is the epitome of professionalism. Everyone was extremely kind, charismatic, and personable. Marcy, an extremely polite lady escorted me to the waiting room. Once I was in the waiting room I was greeted by a gentlemen named Steven Alvarez. Steven was courteous, funny, and very professional. Most people do the bare minimum when it comes to their job, however, Steven was consistent in going out his way for patients.

Best ER experience I’ve ever had!
I took my significant other here in the middle of the night last week. We were greeted by a friendly, calm employee at the front desk who helped us right away. The triage nurse saw us immediately, literally within two or three minutes. Once in the ER bed, my boyfriend was seen by a Physician’s Assistant in less than five minutes, who quickly diagnosed him. A nurse brought medications in a few minutes after that, and then discharge instructions. I have NEVER had such a quick and efficient ER visit! Every person we encountered was friendly, efficient, and helpful. Everything was clean and organized. The entire visit took less than an hour.
I subtracted one star only because of the parking. We tried to enter the garage at first, but I guess it’s closed at night (we didn’t notice any signs that said so even though there are a zillion parking-​related signs). It took a second pass at driving by for us to realize that the ER has it’s own parking spots available right at the entrance. Once we parked, I still wasn’t sure if we were supposed to be there until I asked someone. I think the signage could be better to assist someone who is driving a loved one in an emergency situation. Other than that, we had a perfect experience.
I will absolutely come to this ER for any emergency, and I feel lucky to live only a few blocks away from this hospital.

Great hospital! ⁵⁄₅. My dad twisted his ankle a few summers ago and it took an unusually long time to heal. We were referred to Dr. Wodajo and he found a tumor in my fathers ankle. It was benign, thank God, but it was eating away his bone. Dr. Wodajo removed my fathers tumor and all the staff and the volunteers were exceptionally kind and very helpful, to a T. I highly recommend VA Hospital Center and Dr. Wodajo.
Also, the layout of the hospital is beautiful and it’s an open floor plan. There’s tons of natural light and its just very very beautiful!

Recently needed to avail myself of VHC’s diagnostic imaging services.
Airy, spacious waiting areas (replete with waterfall).
Wonderfully empathetic & helpful staff (both on the registration and technical sides).
Easy initial electronic check-​in (the UX *could* be improved, but it’s pretty good overall). Everything on-​time as scheduled (being advised to be there a half-​hour early to register was spot-​on advice).
I’m certainly not qualified to opine on the nature of the imaging equipment, but certainly it seemed modern.
And a minimal wait to get a CD copy of the scans.
All in all, I was delighted.
Oh yeah … did I mention the wonderfully empathetic & helpful staff?

Oh Where to begin… If this Unilocaler were to use the analogy of Dante’s Inferno starting with the least level of hell and going towards the worst then I would go in this order:
DOCTORS! I think might be the obvious first level… In this humble UnilocalER’s opinion (for whatever that means), I think the doctor’s are pretty damn good here. But what scale do you want to measure ‘good’ on — Binary; Alive or Dead. Well, I am still alive? Or Pain of 1 to 10… I think this is a little arbitrary b/​c one man’s pain is another’s man’s bullet wound. Either way, this Unilocaler likes the doctor’s here.
PARKING: Next level of hell down would be the Gold & Blue Parking lots and b/​c it is located in ARLINGTON — you guessed it — all Unilocalers (and non-​yelpers) must pay alike. There is Street parking with ParkMoble Ap!
SIGNAGE: Next level would be the CONFUSING way of getting INTO the hospital itself. You would think that b/​c this is a hospital, the signs would be LARGE and easy to read… maybe NOT confusing at all. but this Unilocaler and this Unilocaler’s friend’s & family has commented on several occasions that the signage on both the outside and inside is TERRIBLY confusing and NOT USEFUL.
HOSPITAL HR: As this Unilocaler described before, the Doctors here are pretty TOP NOTCH! With that being said, the HR staff is NOT. In today’s world of:
1. The internet
2. Email
3. people moving around
4. Cell Phones
5. Constant Communication
aka CONNECTIVITY – The HR staff does minimal output to assist patients with getting the data entry correct. Part of this is a national problem but part of this can be solved at the hospital level. Communication policy should not simply be solely by letter mail that can be sent to a previous address – these policies should be re-​examined and updated.
OVERALL: The MEDICAL CARE is Top Notch but the rest of the Care is Sub Par :(

I had a medical emergency in December of 2014 where I was cared for at Virginia Hospital Center.
After all the insurance was taken care of, I received a bill for the amount that was charged. I received the various bills from Fairfax county EMS along with the bill for this the care within around 10 days of each other and paid out all of the bills at one time before the end of February.
The bill for the Virginia Hospital Center was marked due on 03÷05÷15 and I could clearly see the amount taken off of my account as of this, 02÷27÷15.
Some idiot at VHC decided to send me to a collection agency BEFORE the due date on the form! It was already debited from my account before I got the collection notice. I got the collection notice before the statement due date. You can’t make incompetence like this up!
This is unbelievable and speaks about how organized this hospital is.

They are part of the Inova hospital family. My experiences have all been really good. I’ve been to the ER there probably 4 or 5 times. I’ve never had to wait long to get seen. They have a sense of urgency (as they should), and are very knowledgable and friendly. One time I had to take someone who was kind of freaking out about an injury and they did an awesome job of calming her down. I was also freaking out once when I went, and the same treatment, they made me feel very reassured.
Great staff, very clean, very quick.

It’s unfortunate but I have to downgrade my rating with Arlington Hospital Center. I am sure that there are some awesome doctors here but my last experience with them were less than spectacular.
After experiencing a very high fever for several days his doctor recommended that we check in at the emergency room for further testing. Instead of getting the professional medical attention, we got front row seats to the amateur tech variety hour. When he drew blood, blood splattered all over his gloves and scrubs. The tech made fun of my husband for being sick, told us he had the flu and sent us home. We had to go back again a couple of days later again and they ran tests again. Nothing but a prescription for a Z pack. Finally mom came to check on my husband since he wasn’t getting better, took one look at him and drove him to the ER at Fairfax Hospital where she works. He was immediately admitted for a blood infection that was about to turn septic. WTF.
I totally take back my words of spawning a human being here. I am going to stay far, far away.

I had to go to the ER tonight for undisclosed reasons of which I won’t mention on here. What I will mention is that I was seen immediately. Pure luck in my opinion to be taken back literally before I even finished my paper work. In total my visit was 7 hours, and all of that was in the ER in my room. Not the waiting room. The nurses took my vitals, and I was put straight into a room where they hooked me up to an IV along with other fluids that I needed at the time.
Dr. Jennifer McBride is a godsend. She was completely professional and as sweet as a buttercup smells. She put me at ease and broke things down to me where I had a clear understanding about what I was about to endure. I had a lot to have done — and she relaxed me with her demeanour.
My nurse I had was Sophie Jones. She was witty and a bit sarcastic, but in a good way. I got her sense of humour, and once again — she helped me as I needed and clearly communicated to me what the doctor’s orders were in the 6 hour period I was in the hospital.
I have not gone to the ER for myself since I was a small child… likely the first time in almost 25 years. I am 28. One could only wish that all hospital visits were as smooth and relaxing as this one. I sure hope I don’t have to go back any time soon, but for what it is worth — it was pleasant and really easy despite my intense pain and nausea I was experiencing.
Just as a side tidbit — they have possibly the best OB/​GYN docs and staff in the DC metro area. If you have needs that require these services, this is where I’d come before going to INOVA or anywhere in DC. This recommendation came to me from a Georgetown University Hospital nurse who suggested I make my way here versus her hospital.
Like I said, I hope I don’t have to return any time soon. Not unless for childbirth or well… nothing really beyond that for a long time.
If you ever need to be pricked, probed, or have tubes put into you (I experienced all 3) — this is where I recommend coming. I just hope you never have the ‘need’ for that.

Wow… even as an elite Unilocaler, I sometimes surprise myself when I forget to write a review for a place that I’ve been to several times.
The «Top 100 Hospital» banner draped across the building exterior finally caught my attention as I was walking in. Perhaps that unconsciously colored my perception of the improved quality of care that I received.
I checked in and the receptionist was very kind and I hadn’t even had my first cup of coffee yet. I couldn’t since I had to fast before my test to see just how elite I was.
Honey buns! If you are reading this now, please stop here! I don’t want you to get the wrong idea.
I only had to wait for a few minutes before Vanessa, a young attractive lady called me in to the room. With a name like Vanessa, I’ll let you decide how attractive she was. So anyway she tells me to disrobe, puts me up on the gurney, then asks me if I’m comfortable with her doing it. I didn’t know if my heart could handle this kind of excitement being the an old married fart, but there was a snowballs chance in hell that I’m going to say NO! My curiosity is stronger than that of a cat high on ‘nip. I boldly tell her there isn’t another person on earth that I’d rather share this experience with.
So she closes the door, and dims the light. *insert Grrrrr sound byte here* Oooh-la-la!That’s when the magic happens. She slathers warm lubricant all over my body and with her soft, dainty hands starts going back and forth, back and forth. At times she’s pressing me hard, almost uncomfortable, but the sadistic side of me is enjoying this. We even try different positions, but before I know it, she’s done. This is the part I hate, where she leaves me and tells me to get dressed. I feel like a used, wet paper towel. I feel cold and dejected. I don’t remember the first time I did this, but I certainly will remember this time for a long time! It was the best I’ve had.
She returns and tells me all the images came out great and that the doctor will get the results of my ultrasound in a couple of days. Finally… *cue Grrrrr sound byte again* I can break my fast!
What were you thinking?

This review is for labor/​delivery. This hospital is the oldest and most run-​down I’ve ever seen.
You have to pay for parking and the parking is a long walk to where-​ever you end up in the hospital. Someone hit my car while I was in the parking lot here and didn’t leave a note. I was parked right in front of a surveillance camera and the surly security guards refused to even look at the tape to see if the license plate could be identified.
The rooms are cold and uncomfortable. The temperature controls in the room don’t work, and when I complained that it was too cold, the nurses told me to cover the air vent with a blanket!
The anesthesiology staff is totally incompetent. My wife was in severe pain throughout the delivery and two of their anesthesiologists stood there and did nothing throughout the procedure. It was like being in a third world country’s hospital.
The pediatric care was the worst and most incompetent I’ve EVER EXPERIENCED.
Some of the nurses were good but some were very slow and stupid.
The food here tastes like recycled garbage. The only reason I didn’t starve to death is because there’s a subway restaurant next to the café.

I have been to many hospitals, but this hospital is pretty nice. From the outside, it’s looks meh. Inside, I was blown away with all the high clean modern décor and lighting.
Parking — I have yet been to a parking garage that offers a card on the parking level. It conveniently gives you a reminder card of where you have parked. $ 5 parking, perfect! Less than 30 mins parking, free!
Service — So far so good. The receptionist was kind at the front desk. The nurses did not hesitate to help me when asked for certain things.
Professionalism — Is definitely found here.
Technology — Somewhat high tech.
It’s no wonder this hospital is one of the top 100 of the US.
They treated my parents in law on two separate occasions fairly well. Therefore, since they had great experience here and was well taken care of, this hospital is the it place for healthcare.