UPMC to Build Pittsburgh Hospitals for $2B

By Barbra Murray

UPMC Heart and Transplant Hospital

UPMC wants to take patient care in metropolitan Pittsburgh to a new level with the development of three state-of-the-art hospitals. The health-care provider will invest $2 billion to open the UPMC Heart and Transplant Hospital, UPMC Hillman Cancer Hospital and UPMC Vision and Rehabilitation Hospital. The facilities will total more than 1.6 million square feet.

“Working in partnership with the University of Pittsburgh Schools of the Health Sciences, we will radically change health care as we know it to provide personalized, effective and compassionate care. At core, these digitally based specialty hospitals are the expression of our cutting-edge translational science creating treatments and cures for the most devastating diseases,” Jeffrey Romoff, president & CEO of UPMC, said in a prepared statement.

UPMC Hillman Cancer Center

The Hillman Cancer Hospital will feature a 240,000-square-foot inpatient tower and a 160,000-square-foot outpatient building on the UPMC Shadyside campus. The Heart and Transplant Hospital, which will be located at UPMC Presbyterian in Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood, will be the largest of the three facilities, with 940,000 square feet in a 15-story tower featuring 620 private patient rooms. Completing the group is the 300,000-square-foot Vision and Rehabilitation center at the UPMC Mercy campus.

UPMC’s new hospitals will boast prominence beyond Pennsylvania and even the U.S., and not just for their innovative services. A joint venture of renowned architecture firm HOK and local firm IKM are behind the design of the Vision and Rehabilitation, but UPMC has another idea for developing the design of the Heart and Transplant Hospital and the Hillman Cancer Hospital. “We are inviting select architects to participate in a [international] design competition with the goal of creating facilities that are as awe-inspiring as the research and care that will take place within them—vibrant additions to the Pittsburgh cityscape,” Leslie Davis, senior vice president of UPMC and executive vice president & chief operating officer of the Health Services Division, told Commercial Property Executive.

Digital hospitals

UPMC Vision and Rehabiliation Hospital

The hospitals will be replacement facilities; they won’t result in the addition of more beds, but they will bring about, as UPMC describes, digital hospitals of the future. Microsoft is working with UPMC to make the high-tech premise a reality.

UPMC plans to debut the Vision and Rehabilitation Hospital in 2020, and open the Hillman Cancer Center in 2022.

Images courtesy of UPMC