New UVM Medical Center Facility to Cost Nearly $130M

UVM from page 8

Modern Facility to Allow for More Complex Surgeries

The new UVM Medical Center facility, projected to take two years to complete after regulatory approval, would replace all five outpatient surgical rooms at the Fanny Allen campus in Colchester. Some outpatient surgeries now performed on the main campus also would move, opening space for more complex surgeries, Leffler said.

The Green Mountain Care Board previously approved two independent outpatient surgical centers, both in Colchester, but has limited their offerings: the Green Mountain Surgery Center, and a connected facility, the Collaborative Surgery Center. The first was approved in 2017 and opened in 2019, while the second center had its certificate of need approved by the board in March 2022

Another independent surgical center, Vermont Eye Surgery Center in South Burlington, has been open since 2008.

50 mi. of Boston without commuter rail access.

Last spring, South Coast Rail construction hit the midway point, and work on one of the lines in the system had neared completion as of the end of the year. State and local officials celebrated the substantial completion of the Fall River Secondary Line with a ribbon cutting at Freetown Station on Dec. 5.

When the Church Street Station construction finishes, it will be the next to last stop to the New Bedford station on Acushnet Avenue, the last point on the New Bedford Main Line, which will be serviced by the pedestrian bridge. MBTA officials said the line will offer a “one-seat trip” to Boston in less than 90 minutes. Passenger service is expected to begin late this year.

The agency also plans to run three morning peak trains and three evening peak trains to both New Bedford and Fall River.

Aside from the two New Bedford stations and two in Fall River, the East Taunton Station and the Middleborough Station have also been under construction, according to the Standard-Times. At full buildout, commuter rail service on the Stoughton Line will extend to the New Bedford and Fall River lines.

Council Also Votes On Street Project

In an unrelated matter, the New Bedford City Council also voted Jan. 26 to refer to committee a request by Mitchell that the city solicitor be allowed to obtain appraisals and prepare an order of taking for land located on County Street, from Nelson Street to Union Street, for the purpose of “acquiring permanent and temporary easements for roadway paving, sidewalk reconstruction with new pedestrian ramps, new pavement markings, traffic signal upgrades, tree plantings and new green infrastructure areas.”

The mayor said the purpose for the appraisals is to build a road reconstruction project on County Street by the city’s Department of Public Infrastructure and the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) with the aid of federal funds. 

The certificate of need application for the new outpatient surgery center in South Burlington suggests that planners believe most of the procedures at the facility would, at least initially, be in the areas of orthopedics, ear, nose and throat health, and ophthalmology.

VTDigger noted that the new UVM facility would include enough interior space to easily add another four operating rooms and supporting space in the future. That type of growth is not currently possible at Fanny Allen, where surgical rooms were built in the 1960s and are too narrow to allow for certain kinds of procedures and collaborations, Leffler said.

The new outpatient surgery center would need to staff 166 employees, with the majority coming from within the UVM Center as the operating rooms move. However, fully staffing the new center would require adding 78 positions, which the hospital plans to begin recruiting for 18 months prior to opening.

UVM leaders said that they do not anticipate either staffing or financial concerns to stall the project.

Additionally, the outpatient surgery center would allow the hospital to provide the same service it currently does at a lower cost. As a result, it is expected to begin to pay for itself within six months, Leffler told VTDigger.

Network officials expect the ultramodern facility would serve as a draw to clinicians and others, plus, jobs at outpatient surgery centers are typically easier to fill, according to Eappen.

“People want to work in ambulatory surgery centers,” he explained. “[In general, it’s] considered to be a very positive place to work.” 