University of Pennsylvania Announces $1.5 Billion Hospital Pavilion
The Pavilion will house 500 private patient rooms and 47 operating rooms in a 1.5-million-square-foot, 17-story facility.
The University of Pennsylvania, located in Philadelphia, will build a $1.5 billion new hospital on Penn Medicine’s West Philadelphia campus. The Pavilion, which will house inpatient care for the Abramson Cancer Center, heart and vascular medicine and surgery, neurology and neurosurgery, and a new emergency department, is expected to be completed in 2021. The facility will be the largest capital project in Penn’s history.
The Pavilion will house 500 private patient rooms and 47 operating rooms in a 1.5-million-square-foot, 17-story facility on the former site of Penn Tower, across the street from the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and adjacent to the medical campus’s outpatient hub, the Perelman Center for Advanced Medicine.
The Pavilion will include an adaptable room concept through which patient rooms are equipped to flex between an intensive care unit set-up, if needed, and a standard room as patients recover, or as the patient population and caregiving needs change in the coming years. Each room will include a private bath and an area for family members and caregivers to stay close by.
The hospital also will feature hybrid operating rooms and telemedicine functionality. Emphasis will be put on an eco-friendly construction, design and operations plan through pursuit of LEED certification.
The building’s design has been informed by consultation with Penn Medicine staff, from physicians and nurses to environmental and dining services workers. These groups have engaged with the design team through a series of tours and patient care simulations in multiple full-size mock-ups of the new facility’s inpatient units as well as operating rooms, family waiting areas and spaces for staff. Patients and families have also participated in tours and provided feedback.
The design and planning process for the Pavilion has been orchestrated by PennFirst, an Integrated Project Delivery (IPD) team consisting of the healthcare design firm HDR, architect Foster+Partners, and engineering firm BR+A, as well as construction management by L.F. Driscoll and Balfour Beatty.