The integrated project delivery model and co-location approach to designing the project has resulted in a high level of co-ordination. This has enabled Banner Health to make key decisions on the most efficient version of creating ‘universal rooms’ that can flex between ICU and medical-surgical patient accommodation according to the hospital’s needs. The structural grid and engineering systems provide flexibility for these universal rooms to become exam rooms or house functions such as outpatient care or preventative health and wellness activities.
This flexibility is important in Phoenix where the population is both growing and ageing which means that care and treatment needs are likely to change over time. It allows for new technologies and treatments to be accommodated. Surgery and administrative functions have been positioned in the new tower to enable future expansion, and also positioned in the campus plan to provide a future tower with the best adjacency for future modalities or patient care areas, the same efficient structural grid spacing, access to daylight and views to the outside. Occupancy sensors and modulating air valves in the surgery area provide heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) setbacks in the operating rooms during unoccupied times, while maintaining required pressure relationships.
