COLUMBUS – Following a year of upheaval, big changes are coming to OSU’s Wexner Medical Center in the form of two additions, one of which is being billed as the largest single facilities project ever undertaken at the university.
The expansion includes an inpatient tower near the main hospital complex on the east Side of the Olentangy River and an ambulatory center on West Campus, both part of what university officials call a “flagship academic medical center.”
“We envision a medical campus in which all building projects integrate and support each other and where the very best people work together across areas of expertise to further elevate the quality of the medical center and the entire university,” said university president Michael Drake.
The university announced Wednesday that it would begin seeking design professionals for the facilities. The cost of the addition would be determined during the design process.
The announcement came on the heels of the hospital’s most financially successful fiscal year but also a period which saw the resignation of Dr. Sheldon Retchin as executive vice president of health sciences and the hospital’s CEO amid reports of complaints from physicians about hospital operations.
“Together, these projects advance key strategic focus areas for the university, including teaching and learning, research and creative expression, and academic health care,” said Bruce McPheron, executive vice president and provost.
The 840-bed outpatient tower, the largest project in university history, would replace the facilities currently housed in Rhodes and Doan Halls and is planned for the area bounded by the Comprehensive Cancer Center – James Cancer Hospital and Solove Research Institute to the east, Cannon Drive to the west, 12th Avenue to the north and Medical Center Drive on the south.
In addition to the 840 beds, all in private rooms, the facility till include 60 neonatal intensive care unit bassinets, an emergency department, imaging, operating rooms, critical care and medical andsurgical beds.
It would be connected to the James Cancer Hospital, Rhodes Hall, Doan Hall and the Brain and Spine Hospital and plans call for additional green space and a new parking garage west of McCampbell Hall.
The ambulatory center would provide outpatient operating rooms, urgent care with a 23-hour observation unit, an endoscopy unit, a pre-anesthesia center, diagnostic imaging and interventional radiology and will be located on land primarily bound by Kenny Road to the east, the Carmack parking lots to the west, Carmack Road to the north and the electrical sub-station to the south.
Parking, roadway work and green space considerations will be part of the project.