University Health to break ground on new Women’s and Children’s Hospital
A line of children and mothers drove the first ceremonial shovels into the sand today, and the Children’s Chorus of San Antonio raised their voices in celebration of the construction of a new hospital — the only one in South Texas dedicated exclusively to the needs of women and children.
The Women’s and Children’s Hospital at University Hospital will be a 14-story, state-of-the-art, 300-bed, half-million-square-foot facility with a 900-space patient and visitor parking garage connected to it.
“The women, the babies, and the children who will come through the doors of this new hospital will have unique needs and challenges, and we will be there to meet them with compassion and kindness,” said University Health CEO George B. Hernández, Jr. “These are the values we will bring to our work. This is our promise as we do our part to shape the future - one voice, one patient, one person, at a time.”
University Health’s status as an academic health center strengthens this promise on multiple levels, he said. “We are very proud of our partnership with the UT Health San Antonio Long School of Medicine.”
The health system is the only locally owned, locally headquartered health system in the area, with a mission to serve the entire region. And your new hospital will be at the center of a network of collaborative care that reaches patients in the communities where they live, collaborating with the best minds at UT Health San Antonio, and coordinating it all through the most advanced patient medical record available.
The Women’s and Children’s Hospital will meet the needs of a fast-growing South Texas population. The health system was able to accomplish this by taking advantage of favorable market conditions to refinance existing bonds used to build the Sky Tower at University Hospital and new facilities at the Robert B. Green campus downtown.
“This project is really the next phase of our 2008 Capital Improvement Program,” said James Adams, chairman of the Bexar County Hospital District Board of Managers. “Unlike many other public hospital districts, the percent of our budget coming from local property taxes is shrinking … Today, we are not only breaking ground on a state-of-the-art women’s and children’s hospital, we are doing it with no tax rate increase.”
The hospital’s expected completion date is summer 2023 – and the entire process can be viewed live via two webcams.
