VCU’s Wonder Tower (Photo courtesy VCU Health System)
The ongoing pandemic has done little to hinder a construction boom across metro Richmond. Around the region, millions have been invested in infrastructure projects for health care providers. That includes the vertical extension of Bon Secours St. Francis Medical Center in Midlothian, as well as an array of projects for VCU Health, including its Wonder Tower for the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU.
Meeting Community Needs
VCU Health alone has about $1 billion in projects either recently completed or in the works in downtown Richmond. That includes its $384 million Adult Outpatient Pavilion, which opened in December 2021; redevelopment of the old Public Safety Building site; and finishing work on the $400 million inpatient pediatric facility known as the Wonder Tower.
The 16-story, 500,000-square-foot pediatric facility will house inpatient and emergency care for children, and it’s set to open in spring 2023. It will offer 72 private, inpatient beds, along with services that include acute and intensive care; an ER for hematology/oncology and bone marrow transplant; a Level I pediatric trauma center and a helipad; epilepsy monitoring; and imaging. It also will offer amenities for families and spaces for play. The structure has four stories underground for parking. Located on Marshall Street between 10th and 11th streets, it’s connected to the outpatient Children’s Pavilion. It will serve as a central location for children’s care, combining services currently in the VCU Medical Center.
“That will be a transformational space,” says Arthur L. Kellermann, CEO of VCU Health System and Virginia Commonwealth University’s senior vice president for health sciences. “It’s so thoughtfully laid out.”
The children’s hospital draws pediatric patients from 44 states, and Kellermann anticipates that it will continue to draw nationally, from all points across the country.
The 17-story adult inpatient pavilion includes 615,000 square feet of clinical space for 26 outpatient specialties. That includes care for patients in obstetrics and gynecology, dermatology, orthopedics, urology, oncology and neurology. Most of the outpatient services for the VCU Massey Cancer Center are now in the pavilion, and there are also 1,000 parking spaces in the 425,000-square-foot parking deck. VCU Health estimates that the facility will serve some 200,000 patients each year.
The facility consolidates care previously offered by clinics in the Ambulatory Care Center, North Hospital and the Nelson Clinic.
Also in December, VCU Health opened a $21 million ambulatory surgery center in the Short Pump Pavilion. The 22,210-square-foot outpatient surgery facility in Henrico County can handle procedures for up to 30 patients daily, including surgery for ear, nose and throat conditions, as well as gynecologic, orthopedic, plastic, oncologic and urologic surgeries.
VCU has targeted spring to start a redevelopment of the former Public Safety Building on North 10th Street. The project includes 150,000 square feet of office space. Plans also call for transforming 125,000 square feet into 145 extended-stay rooms for guests through The Doorways program to provide lodging to patients and family, plus another 65,000 square feet for 60 guest rooms for Ronald McDonald House Charities, serving Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU patients and their families. It also will have a retail pharmacy and dining, a 35,000-square-foot child care center operated by VCU Health, and 1,200 parking spaces.
Extra capacity was built into the projects to accommodate any needs that arise, Kellermann says.
The Bon Secours St. Francis Medical Center addition (Image courtesy Bon Secours)
Works in Progress
Farther afield, Bon Secours went vertical for its addition to St. Francis Medical Center in Midlothian, while also breaking walls for its expansion at Memorial Regional Medical Center in Mechanicsville.
Bon Secours also is adding a free-standing unit in Chesterfield that’s set to open in June, according to Dr. Christopher S. Accashian, chief operating officer for Bon Secours Richmond Health System.
A ceremonial wall-breaking was held in October on the work at Memorial Regional. The $48.5 million project will add 11 beds to the ICU and another 33 for medical and surgical patients. The initiative includes West Pavilion, a 48,000-square-foot expansion, and renovation of current space. The new pavilion repurposes space previously occupied by Sheltering Arms, and it will include inpatient orthopedic and neurosciences units. The pavilion is targeted for opening late this year, and the entire project should be finished early in 2023.
The $108 million St. Francis work will add 55 acute-care beds to the medical center. The project entails 178,869 square feet of space, including 69,169 square feet of renovated space and 109,700 square feet of new construction. It involves adding two floors to the critical care tower at the facility, and beds will be added for medical, surgical, obstetrics and intensive care.
The project includes 10 observation beds, which will free up inpatient space. Pre-admission testing will also be expanded, and an MRI unit will be relocated to St. Francis, the only such unit for Bon Secours facilities south of the city.
When the work is finished, St. Francis will have 185 beds. Completion is targeted for early 2024.
Also in 2021, Bon Secours broke ground on an 11-bed emergency department and imaging center on U.S. Highway 1 in Chester. The 24,000-square-foot facility is an extension of St. Francis, and it’s slated to open later this year.
In Petersburg, the 300-bed Bon Secours Southside Medical Center has undergone investment in updating equipment since it was purchased in early 2020 by Bon Secours, with improvements to facilities including its catheterization labs and imaging services, making for “some of the nicest facilities we have,” Accashian says.
HCA Richmond’s works in progress include rebuilding its radiology department at Henrico Doctors’ Hospital. The cutting-edge equipment will enhance early detection and action in treating strokes as the facility seeks to grow its services into a Comprehensive Stroke Program, according to Ryan Jenson, chief executive officer for Henrico, Parham and Retreat Doctors’ hospitals. “This will allow us to take care of all types of stroke patients and provide surgical interventions when necessary,” he says.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held in February 2021 to commemorate the opening of the neonatal intensive care unit at HCA’s Johnston-Willis Hospital. (Photo courtesy HCA Healthcare)
Also in progress is a $19.9 million, 35-bed addition to Johnston-Willis that should open later this year. The project began in September 2021. Johnston-Willis added a 12,000-square-foot neonatal intensive care unit with 20 beds in 2021. It was part of a $16.9 million investment that also included eight additional ortho-spine inpatient beds and the creation of an obstetric triage area.
Central Virginia VA Health Care System has made a $160 million investment in projects for its facilities. That includes a Women’s Health Center that’s under construction. Other projects in the works include a Community Living Center addition, a new laboratory, a cancer center and a data center. In 2021, the VA opened clinics in Henrico County and Spotsylvania County, and it broke ground on a health care center in Fredericksburg.
The Pandemic’s Impact
Lessons learned during the pandemic may change future infrastructure investments in a variety of ways.
For instance, Kellermann notes that health care providers had to scramble to retrofit rooms for negative pressure, in which the air pressure in a room with a patient is lower than the regular air pressure outside the room. That helps mitigate the spread of an airborne vector like the COVID-19 coronavirus; when a door is opened to the room, air stays inside instead of flowing out. Kellermann contends that more of those spaces will be budgeted in future facilities.
Negative pressure rooms are included in the work at St. Francis, according to Accashian. Rooms also are being adapted to make it easier to provide virtual health and telemedicine, he says, as procedures that were cobbled together during the early days of the pandemic become standards of care. “As we’ve evolved, we’ve learned to make those investments in infrastructure,” Accashian says. “Things that we had to piece together, we’re now planning for and getting ready to turn on.”
There also has been a boom in telehealth and home health care, including monitoring from home. Much of behavioral health care has switched to remote sessions. Kellermann says that has enabled providers to see more patients.
“Things that we had to piece together [during the pandemic], we’re now planning for.” —Christopher S. Accashian, chief operating officer, Bon Secours Richmond
“We think that will be a permanent, lasting feature,” he says.
Kellermann also noted that the rise in work-at-home opportunities and the emptying of space in office towers may lead to smaller projects. There will be major activity, but “high-rise offices might not be the best usage,” he says.
Engineering strategies for these projects are patient-focused, with a logical, easy-to-navigate layout and care in one place instead of scattered across multiple locations on campus, Kellermann says.
Beyond infrastructure, VCU is working on addressing inequities in health care in metro Richmond. One aspect of that will be the development of a school of public health. Kellermann says that VCU Health serves as Richmond’s medical safety net, serving people “others aren’t anxious to treat” — the poor, those who have no insurance or are underinsured. “It’s been a major focus for us,” he says.
At Bon Secours, infrastructure and other needs are assessed regularly, Accashian says, with consideration given to factors ranging from demographic changes to technology. Bon Secours conducted a community needs survey of its Richmond unit operations in December, and that effort continues through February.
“Over the next two or three years, you should see a big difference,” Accashian says.
