The new Patient Tower is the central element of a $450 million, eight-year master plan to renew this 650-bed tertiary campus serving southwest Missouri and northwest Arkansas. The tower creates a new main entrance and signature image for the campus, designed to represent the sophisticated level of medical care available within.
The nine level tower includes six inpatient nursing floors (Med/Surg, Women's Services, ICU and Cardiology) that replace all remaining nursing units in the original 1958 facility. Consideration of market competitiveness, nursing efficiency and capital use effectiveness factored into the decision to create two nursing units per floor, with 2/3 of the rooms private and 1/3 with sufficient depth and technology for semi-private flex. A conventional central nurse work area, preferred by the users, is augmented with state-of-the-art distributed information technologies.
Size: 352,000 sf
Status: Completed 2008
Award: 2008 Project of the Year, Springfield Contractors Association
Creating a new “front door” for the hospital was especially important given St. John's position as a regional referral destination.
A signature image for the building is a15-foot circular stained glass window featuring the Mercy cross.
The ground and first floors contain a generous lobby and public function spaces including meeting rooms, admitting, patient accounts and administration.
The interior design themes for public and clinical spaces in the Patient Tower were developed as part of institution-wide, comprehensive interior and wayfinding master plans.
A display wall along this conference room corridor tells the history of St. John's. Other historic elements in the tower include the reuse and refurbishment of elements from the original St. John's Hospital building.
A courtyard with fountain is a relaxing spot for patients, visitors and staff. Brick pavers are utilized as donor recognition elements.
Patient rooms offer sleeper sofas for family members, wireless internet and views of the campus green space or courtyard.
The central nurse work area is augmented with state-of-the-art distributed information technologies, including electronic health records.
