Stafford Hospital Center realizes fast-track success

Stafford Hospital Center, the first new hospital in Virginia in more than 30 years, recently opened its doors. Ellerbe Becket, along with Whiting-Turner Construction and the leadership of MediCorp Health System, provided full master planning, design—including the structural engineering—and construction administration services for this new healthcare project.

This fast-track, 250,000-square-foot, five-story, community hospital will help define the emerging downtown Stafford County and is flexible enough to meet the future health care needs of the fast-growing Stafford community.

A few of the hospital’s special features include:

• Diagnostic and treatment facilities, an emergency department, cardiopulmonary services, imaging, and surgery, supporting 100 inpatient beds.
• A traditional Virginia design style with some contemporary elements.
• A dramatic three-story atrium that serves as a central organizing feature.
• A 65-acre greenfield landscape with a walking trail along the wetlands and a pond providing a peaceful amenity for patients and their families.
• Views of daylight, connecting patients and families with the healing effect of nature.
• Art created by regional artists that along with the architecture creates a beautiful healing environment.
• Flexible and effective patient care spaces while creating a welcoming environment in which patients, families and staff can feel calm, comfortable and secure.
• Low VOC flooring, as well as low VOC paints, ceiling tiles and accent wallcovering were used to promote healthy indoor air quality.
• Special zones for caregivers, patients and families in patient rooms.
• Centralized nurse stations as well as mobile computer work stations throughout each unit. In addition, the patient room design includes a nurse work zone at the footwall to allow nurses to be closer to patients.

This project was designed on a fast-track schedule, with the structural design progressing ahead of the other disciplines. An early foundation package was released, followed by an early steel package that was released for construction at about the same time as the architecture and other disciplines were completing their design development (DD phase) drawings.

The early release of these two packages permitted foundation work to begin on site much earlier, and permitted steel detailing and fabrication to proceed much earlier than normal. During construction the contractor continued this effort by erecting the patient tower portion of the project first, permitting this area to be "dried-in" early and thus allowing the interior build-out to proceed from the top-down (this was desirable so that work would not be tracked through completed areas).

The design and construction of the central plant area also took scheduling into consideration, as it was necessary for the central plant area to be completed and the mechanical systems on-line to permit the completion of the patient tower and medical spaces. In addition to these efforts during design, there was a very cooperative spirit between the engineer, construction manager, and the steel fabrication, which helped to foster a team approach and contributed to the overall achievement.

Photo credit: Don Pearse Photography, Inc.