ERDMAN recently received a National Award of Merit in the Healthcare Facilities category from the Design-Build Institute of America for its services on the surgical and procedural care expansion of St. Luke’s in Duluth, MN. The project has transformed the capabilities of St. Luke’s Health Care System and elevated the level of medical care available to the local community.
A panel of industry experts judged eligible projects based on excellence in design, team performance, and the quality of the design-build process. Award-winning projects had to achieve more than budget and schedule goals; they needed to demonstrate exceptional project delivery practices.
The 36,000-square-foot expansion project enables St. Luke’s to provide a number of leading-edge surgical techniques formerly unavailable in the Duluth area. The new suite includes two 1,200-square-foot hybrid operating rooms (ORs), four general surgery ORs (one with a DaVinci robot), one EP/IR/cath lab, four endoscopy procedure rooms, and one bronchoscopy procedure room. The suite layout minimizes staff and patient movement, maximizes equipment accessibility, and allows flexibility for future design modifications.
ERDMAN’s delivery model brought together a team from St. Luke’s and a cross-disciplinary team of in-house professionals. A key example of this engagement effort was the construction of on-site mock-ups for OR, pre-op, and corridor areas. Surgeons, nurses, patient support staff, and maintenance personnel toured the mocked-up area to experience the space and provide crucial feedback. This intensely collaborative design approach has also led to a dramatically improved patient experience at St. Luke’s. For example, outpatients now have a convenient dedicated entrance and follow an intuitive pathway to a spacious, calming waiting room.
St. Luke’s vice president, Ronald P. Franzen, said, “ERDMAN’s expertise in healthcare and focus on providing value to our organization was essential to our partnership on this new project. The capability to provide a full range of services, from capital and facility planning through design and construction has been valuable and has simplified the process, allowing us to focus on continuing to put our patients first.”
St. Luke’s and ERDMAN began working together on a master plan beginning in the summer of 2010. The planning set the stage for a series of construction projects, including the surgical unit expansion, that have allowed St. Luke’s to strengthen its regional market share and establish itself through offering a broader range of services to Duluth and the surrounding communities.
About ERDMAN
At ERDMAN(SM), we believe that the questions of new service offerings, population health, patient experience, new care models, and facilities are not separate, isolated challenges. We believe that by looking at these challenges through multiple perspectives simultaneously, we come up with more effective and efficient solutions. Through our Integrative Thinking, we take on the complex challenges of healthcare to help our clients build healthier communities. www.erdman.com
