The design of the Paul and Judy Andrews Women’s Hospital focuses on the principles of family-centered care in a boutique hotel atmosphere. The project includes a five-story, 232,343-square-foot hospital with 110 beds, a 148,380-square-foot medical office building and a 748-vehicle parking garage. Built on an existing surface parking lot, the hospital was designed to connect to the surrounding campus. A sweeping, transparent canopy provides a transition from a landscaped plaza to the lobby atrium, which connects the new women's tower to the main hospital. The exterior of the Women’s Hospital is grounded with stone and brick accents and features a warm, red brick tower with curved balconies overlooking a plaza. Expanses of glass add transparency and flood the interior with natural light.
Full service labor and delivery care with an antepartum unit, maternal fetal medicine clinic, triage suite, and post partum services can accommodate up to 8,000 deliveries per year. Gynecological and neonatal services in the adjacent existing hospital were also expanded as part of this project. A 42-bed NICU with capacity to expand to 60 beds and a separate area for the parent’s sleep rooms were added. A 26-bed ante-partum unit is planned for this floor. An LDR unit with 25 beds and support spaces is adjacent to the 13-bed triage/antenatal unit. A surgical suite with seven operating rooms and support space is also included in the new facility. Additional floors house a 17-bed GYN unit, a 12-bed day patient unit and two, 32-bed post partum units with well baby nursery bassinets.
Visitors enter the hospital through an atrium space flooded with natural daylight and have immediate access to various boutique retail shops. The women’s lobby provides two distinct waiting areas—one for gynecological surgery and one for labor and delivery. The architectural design palette incorporates warm wood tones against a neutral backdrop. Corridors through hospital departments feature accent colors, highlight artwork, create playful ceiling and floor patterns, and provide specialty lighting.
The patient rooms are designed to provide the comforts of home with spa-like amenities. Headwalls and cabinetry conceal medical technology. The zones within the room create levels of access and privacy between care givers, patients and families. In the labor and delivery rooms the family zone is defined by both a transition in the floor color and a privacy curtain, allowing the family to stay in the room if desired. Each room also provides the patient with control of her environment through zoned lighting and individual thermostats.
A new entry plaza creates a serene urban atmosphere previously missing on the campus. Elements such as the circular design (representing the circle of life), fountain, stone seating walls, brick pavers and intimate areas of lawn provide peace, escape and a place of contemplation for patients, family members and staff.
Media
“Fort Worth hospital invests in beautiful surroundings as therapy.” WFAA, March 29, 2012.
