KELOWNA TO GET HEART CENTRE, MORE BEDS, DR. TRAINING

Gov. B.C. News Release
KELOWNA – Kelowna General Hospital will expand to provide future capacity for more patient beds, the Interior’s first-ever revascularization cardiac centre and a planned fourth site for the UBC Faculty of Medicine, Premier Gordon Campbell announced today. “We’re expanding on our initial plans to modernize hospitals in Kelowna and Vernon and building upon our goal to further benefit patients throughout the Okanagan now and over the next decade,” said Campbell. “This expansion will bring specialized heart services closer to home, support population growth and train more doctors in the southern Interior.”The new, enhanced expansion plan builds on the announcement in May 2007 of a new 16,200-square-metre outpatient hospital and quadrupled emergency department at Kelowna General Hospital (KGH) and a new 12,000-square-metre diagnostic and treatment building at Vernon Jubilee Hospital (VJH).

Once completed, two additional floors at Kelowna General Hospital will provide 7,740 square metres of additional in-patient space and accommodate approximately 90 to 150 beds for future patient care needs in the Okanagan. The first additional floor is expected to open by 2013 and the second by 2019.

The revised initial cost of the Kelowna and Vernon hospitals project is now estimated to be approximately $250 million, which includes the additional inpatient floors. However, the final cost of the overall project is dependent on the bids that are submitted as a result of the Request for Proposal (RFP) process and the market conditions throughout the competitive selection process.

The Province will contribute $144 million for the Kelowna and Vernon hospital expansion projects, including the medical school renovations and expansion. The remainder of the funding is identified in the regional hospital districts’ capital plans and will include specified funding for the additional two storeys with the shelled-in space for more hospital beds.

The KGH expansion project is being pursued as a public-private partnership; that is, a private firm will design, build and maintain the facility. The Request for Proposals will be made available shortly to the three qualified proponent teams who were short-listed in June 2007 to participate.