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Baptist MD Anderson Cancer Center in Jacksonville, Fla., responds inside and out to the very specific needs of the patients, families, and staff served there
UNTIL LAST FALL, residents of northeast Florida wanting to get treatment at an MD Anderson Cancer Center had to travel roughly 900 miles to its flagship clinic in Houston. But that changed last September, when MD Anderson teamed with Baptist Health to open a $184 million outpatient clinic in Jacksonville, Fla. The partners say MD Anderson's operating model of providing diagnosis, treatment planning, support, and survivorship services under one roof was sorely needed in the Jacksonville market. The reason: More than 7,000 people there are diagnosed with cancer each year, making it the region's leading cause of death. Baptist officials say the new332,000-square-foot center is designed to provide state-of-the-art care and will also host clinical trials for new drugs.
A design/build consortium consisting of HKS Architects (Dallas) and Freeman White, a Haskell Company (Charlotte, N.C), in conjunction with construction partners DPB Construction (Bedwood City, Calif.) and Perry-McCall (Jacksonville) was hired to create the building to pursue that ambitious mission. Their basic blueprint-drawn up during an intensive seven-month pre-construction process that involved visioning, research, and drawing on Lean and evidence-based design-reflects the "one-stop" multidisciplinary clinic model established by MD Anderson Cancer Center, which partnered with Baptist Health five years ago to create the MD Anderson Cancer Network.
Aholistic approach was adopted by all the firms involved with the project that boiled down to this mantra: "Everything speaks," says Keith Tickell, vice president of strategic assets/ real estate for Baptist...