Project category: New construction (completed December 2004)

Chief administrator: Jack Aenchbacher, President, (469) 814-2105

Firm: PageSoutherlandPage, LLP, (214) 522-3900

Design team: Mattia Flabiano III, AIA, ACHA, Principal-in-Charge; Joshua A. Theodore, AAHC, Director of Health Planning; W. Dee Maxey, AIA, Project Manager; E. Lynn Broyles, PE, Director of MEP Engineering (PageSoutherlandPage, LLP); Robert E. Hill, PE, Principal/Structural Engineer (Brockette/Davis/Drake, Inc.)

Photography: Craig Blackmon, FAIA; Yunjoo Namkoong

Total building area (sq. ft.): 354,400

Construction cost/sq. ft.: $204

Total construction cost (excluding land): $72,322,960


The Baylor Regional Medical Center at Plano was constructed on a 21-acre site and consists of a 354,400-square-foot hospital; a 195,000-square-foot medical office building; a six-level, 1,080-vehicle parking garage; a central plant; and surface parking. Baylor Plano’s goal was to first understand the hospital experience from the patient’s point of view, and second, based on this understanding, to create an environment that eases worries and focuses on health. Every detail of Baylor Plano is part of a healing environment designed to nurture. Patient comfort abounds, from the private, well-appointed patient rooms to the nearby visitors’ lounge where family and friends can prepare a meal, socialize, or just relax.

The hospital’s first phase has inpatient units with 96 beds and a 40-bed day-patient unit. Patient diagnostic and treatment areas include urgent care, imaging, women’s health, endoscopy, surgical procedures, a catheterization lab, and physical medicine. Hospital support areas include a business office and medical records, administration, dietary, laboratory, pharmacy, central processing, materials-management, maintenance, security, housekeeping, and biomedical engineering departments. Hospital diagnostic and treatment activities are located in the lower three stories, including the below-grade garden level. Above this base structure is a five-story patient/nursing tower, providing an impressive and highly visible seven-story facility.

At the lower level, a terraced garden and outdoor courtyard are located outside the café, where light filters into the area through the chapel’s stained-glass windows. This is the perfect place to enjoy a meal and peaceful surroundings.

On the main floor, access to outpatient care and centralized registration is provided. Additionally, a concierge desk for arriving patients, visitors, or conference-center attendees, along with a cyber café and coffee shop bistro, is available.

Thanks to a floor plan that puts each nursing station close to the patient rooms, as well as a low patient-to-nurse ratio, nurses are never more than 25 steps away. The carpeted patient-care floors utilize personal touches and soothing colors in the patient rooms to make recovery as pleasant as possible.

A seven-story medical office building is located across the medical boulevard from the hospital, with an enclosed bridge connecting the two. For patient and staff convenience, a six-level, 1,080-vehicle parking structure is situated near the professional office building and the main hospital entrance.