Construction Begins on $60M Neuroscience Center

University of Cincinnati and UC Health begin construction on $60M neuroscience institute, provides first look inside bizjournals.com /cincinnati/news/2017/05/23/uc-health-begins-construction-of-60m-neuroscience.html

UC Health

UC Health begins construction of $60M neuroscience institute, provides first look inside SUBSCRIBER CONTENT: May 23, 2017, 1:56pm EDT Updated: May 23, 2017, 2:04pm EDT UC Health began construction today on a headquarters for the University of Cincinnati Gardner Neuroscience Institute, a $60.5 million outpatient center in Corryville that will treat people with neurologic and psychiatric diseases.

Messer Construction Co. of Bond Hill is general contractor for the four-story building at 223 Piedmont Ave., UC Health disclosed today.

The Chicago-based Perkins+Will architectural firm designed the 114,000-square-foot building, which will bring together more than 125 faculty doctors and researchers with specialized staff when it opens in 2019.

“This new building will be a place where our entire team of caregivers can work together better for the patient,” said Dr. Rick Lofgren, CEO of UC Health.

Last year more than 56,000 patients were seen by UC Health clinicians within the neurosciences. The institute, which was established in 1998 through a partnership between the UC College of Medicine and UC Health, is now operated out of multiple buildings on the medical campus of the university.

Heavy construction will begin just after Memorial Day on May 29.

Today’s groundbreaking ceremony included the unveiling of a video that provides a virtual view of exterior and interior spaces of the new building. It features renderings of an exam room, a rehab/physical therapy area with floorto-ceiling windows, an elevated outdoor terrace and other areas. The building will include a café, a patient lounge, an auditorium and an outdoor rehabilitation space as well as underground parking.

You can watch the architectural fly-through of the building in the video player accompanying this article or by clicking here.

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Architects solicited ideas from a patient advisory group. Their input was considered in every aspect of design from the conference and education spaces to clinical care locations. Spaces will facilitate collaboration among doctors and incorporate integrative medicine, including yoga, mindfulness, stress reduction, diet education and tai chi.

Doctors also hope to inform food options available in the wellness café.

“We feel like as patients we’ve been heard,” said Don Yelton, who along with his wife, Janice, was part of the patient advisory group. “We’ve had at least a half dozen meetings with the design team.”

All UC Health outpatient neurological care and patient education activities will be provided at the new location, which will afford better access to advanced clinical trials conducted by the hospital system. The facility also is expected to help UC attract and retain top health care professionals in the neuroscience field.

On Monday, the University of Cincinnati revealed that Dr. Joseph Cheng of Yale University has been hired as chair of the UC College of Medicine’s Department of Neurosurgery. He will lead all neurosurgery activities at UC Health and have an office in the new building.

A total of 215 people will work in the new building, which includes those who will be there for their entire workday and others who will spend part of their time there. UC anticipates that about 50 people will be in newly created positions, including doctors, medical assistants, therapists, technologists and other support staff.

“It will be a place to collaborate and continue to transform care through research and education,” said Dr. William Ball, dean of the College of Medicine and senior vice president for health affairs at UC. “Ultimately, this means thousands of patients are offered access to leading-edge research and clinical trials by our faculty physicians.”

The facility will also feature learning spaces for patients, doctors and health professions students who will complete clinical rotations there, Ball said.

The UC Gardner Neuroscience Institute provides care across 14 specialty centers, including treatments for Parkinson’s, epilepsy, brain tumors, mood disorders, stroke care and rehabilitation, and Alzheimer’s disease.

“I’ve been a part of this neuroscience team at UC since the 1980s, and I can honestly say it’s never had as much momentum as it does today,” said Dr. Joseph Broderick, director of the UC Gardner Neuroscience Institute and a professor of neurology at the College of Medicine. “We owe a great deal of that momentum to the support of the Gardner family.”

More than $40 million has been raised so far to help pay for the headquarters building including a $14 million gift from the James J. and Joan A. Gardner Family Foundation of Mason, which is linked to Cintas Corp.

The UC Foundation launched a $54.5 million fundraising campaign in 2015 to contribute to the creation of the new facility and to expand programming at the institute. About $26.6 million of the money donated will help pay for the building and $28 million will go toward program costs. The remaining funds needed for the project are to come from the university and UC Health.

UC Health expects the UC Gardner Neuroscience Institute building to be a landmark. To make way for the headquarters, the university demolished the Piedmont Mews apartment complex off Martin Luther King Jr. Drive.

Barrett J. Brunsman Staff reporter Cincinnati Business Courier

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