Wednesday

Healing by Design: The anatomy of a modern hospital

August 24th 2008 was a red letter day in the Eastern Fraser Valley, BC, Canada. The first new-build hospital for more than thirty years, the Abbotsford Regional Hospital and Cancer Centre (ARHCC), opened its doors. As the old MSA hospital (built over fifty years ago and showing its every year) closed it’s doors for the last time, staff, patients and visitors were settling in at the cutting edge of 21st century hospital design

The ARHCC is Canada’s first public-private-partnership (P3) hospital. This P3 partnership involves the Ministry of Health Services, Fraser Health (the local Health Authority), the Provincial Health Services Authority, the BC Cancer Agency, The Fraser Valley Regional Hospital District, Partnerships BC and Access Health Abbotsford (a consortium of companies). The old MSA hospital was last renovated in 1980 and the population of Abbotsford has increased 2.5 times since then. Local people have waited a long time for this hospital but the consensus of those visiting it on the open days was that it was worth the wait. I visited on 26th August to check out the building for myself. Continue…