Back-to-school week is one of the busiest weeks of the year for local emergency rooms.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, every year, emergency departments across the country treat more than 200,000 children ages 14 and younger for playground-related injuries.
Cook Children's Medical Center in Fort Worth opened its new $14.2 million emergency department to coincide with the start of school.
"Our volume goes up dramatically once school starts, so this was the time to do it," said Dr. Corwin Warmink, medical director of the Emergency Department.
The 36,000 square-foot space has 88 patient beds, 29 more than the old ER.
Technology inside the rooms allow staff to perform procedures from X-rays to ultrasounds right by the patient's bed.
The emergency department has four trauma rooms and several palliative care rooms, where families can go during patients' end-of-life care.
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The medical staff expects a busy week, with playground injuries, falls and sports injuries, like the one Paul Mullins received Monday morning.
The Burleson High School junior injured his collar bone during football practice Monday morning.
"He comes on top of me and I felt a pop. I didn't know what it was. I just knew it hurt," Mullins said.
"He's worked all the way through two-a-days and trying to improve on his position and, you know, here we are," said his mother, Tammie Robinson, who added that spending the morning in the emergency room wasn't what they expected for the first week of school.
She also added that Monday's visit was the latest of several trips to the Cook Children's emergency department.
She has five boys, all of whom play football, and said Monday's visit to the new emergency department was the best experience yet.
"They always take care of us," Robinson said.
