UF Health is adding another hospital to its growing medical campus.
The UF Health board approved funding for a new specialty hospital Wednesday that will hold neuromedicine and cardiovascular services.
The $415 million construction project will be located on Archer Road just east of the UF Health Shands Cancer Hospital. The cost includes equipment and a parking garage with 600 spaces. The building will have 216 beds, including 120 specialized ICU beds.
The idea for a new hospital stemmed from the long-term "Forward Together" plan published in May 2010, which describes the alignment of clinical programs and facilities.
David Guzick, senior vice president for health affairs at UF and president of UF Health, said before "Forward Together," services for particular conditions were distributed throughout the hospital.
"The main hospital was sort of a checkerboard," Guzick said. "The goal was to create an environment for our patients in which the people taking care of them were really focused on their needs and have specialized expertise in that particular area."
With the growing number of patients, UF Health CEO Edward Jimenez said building a new hospital was the next step.
"This new facility allows us to grow in a planned and organized fashion" Jimenez said.
One side of the building will house neuromedicine services, and the other cardiovascular.
"You’re not going to find many hospitals in the country, when we’re done with this, that have lining facilities the way we have," Jimenez said.
Guzick said without this project, the building would get older and not provide the level of care Shands strives for.
"Both from the standpoint of providing the best care for our patients and from the standpoint of ensuring we can do that in the future by recruiting and retaining the best faculty, it really speaks to an exciting future," Guzick said.
Construction is in the final permitting process to get the proper approval from the city and county, and it is set to begin around January 2015. The building is expected to be completed at the end of 2017 and open at the start of 2018.
Guzick said the new building is in line with UF Rising because of the recruitment of preeminent faculty throughout the university.
"When you’re talking about the healthcare component, we’re talking about preeminent clinical programs that become nationally recognized," Guzick said. "And it is right in step with the notion with UF Rising."
[A version of this story ran on page 4 on 9/26/2014]
