The St. Francis Medical Center of Cape Girardeau held a groundbreaking ceremony for their Building on Excellence project this Wednesday.
Construction on the $127 million expansion project began this week, with more construction scheduled to begin December fourth.
Steven Bjelich is President and CEO of St. Francis. He says the expansion project was designed with key input from hospital physicians and staff, as well as patients.
The extension will promote efficiency by placing physicians in closer proximity to patients and allow more patient privacy.
“When we complete the construction project, approximately 65% of all of the patient rooms would have been either renovated or completely built new. That will expand our bed complement, the total number of beds we have, to 320.”
Marilyn Curtis, the Vice President of Professional Services at St. Francis, says the most noticeable difference for patients will be the extra space.
“The Building on Excellence project is a combination of renovated space and the actual new construction,” Curtis said. “It will add over forty [new] private patient rooms, but even more importantly, all of our rooms will now be private.”
Both patients and hospital staff took part in the design process of the expansion project.
Renovations will also take place in the hospital’s Women and Children’s services, which includes the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, and rehabilitation and surgical services.
The Building on Excellence project is expected to bring approximately 250 new full-time employees to the hospital.
Currently, the Building on Excellence project is expected to be completed by 2016.