Private firm to build medical building
Published Tuesday June 2nd, 2009
Non-profit group will lease space to practitioners, professors, researchers
A non-profit company will build a four-storey, 60,000-square-foot building between the former Vanier School and Wheeler Boulevard to house a new Dr.-Georges-L.-Dumont Health Centre, designed to bring researchers, doctors and medical teachers together under one roof.
"We recognize that space is very tight at the Dr. Georges-L.-Dumont Regional Hospital and that other health-related organizations in the region are also looking for new space," Paulette Richard, chairwoman of the health centre's board of directors, said in announcing the new building yesterday.
"We see this as an opportunity to meet those growing needs."
Minister of Health Mike Murphy was on hand for the announcement and said the private venture would not affect the already announced $80-million expansion of the hospital. The Health Department has no agreement to move any services into the new building at this point, Murphy said. However, the non-profit company that will own it clearly expects some health services offered by the Dumont to take advantage of the new space.
More than that, it wants to bring different aspects of medical care, from research to medical education to treatment, all under one roof towards the betterment of medical care in general.
"Our vision is to have strategic infrastructure that will allow key sectors, such as health research, medical training and other specialized services to come under one roof to create synergies," Richard said.
Moncton's renown Atlantic Cancer Research Institute is eyeing a move to the new health-care centre from their cramped quarters in the old section of the Dumont hospital.
"We are looking for new space that will not only accommodate our growing needs, but that will also allow us to interface with key collaborators in a clinical setting," said Dr. Rodney Ouellette, ACRI's director of discovery.
"Research and health can thrive when they are synergistic. Contemporary health care is an integrated process of discovery that is constantly evolving as research, clinical practice and the teaching of new practitioners all interact."
Another possible tenant is the French-language family medicine school, offered by l'Université de Sherbrooke via l'Université de Moncton, which is also in need of far more space in a clinical setting.
The company will not be the one offering medical services. Rather, it will own the building and offer space for lease. It already owns and operates the building which houses the Dieppe Health Centre where the Family Medicine Unit of the Dumont is located, as well as the Miramichi Dialysis Unit and the Shediac Extra-Mural Program's building.
They hope to start work this fall on the new facility, which will be located northeast of the former Vanier School, southwest of Wheeler Boulevard and on the west side of Université Avenue.
Pierre Gallant of Architects 4 said the building would boast a green roof, its own wind generation and large amounts of natural lighting.
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I never heard of a non-profit construction company except maybe the Habitat for Humanity group which builds houses.
Just curious.