DENVER - The new National Jewish Health-Saint Joseph Hospital is coming in slightly under budget and remains scheduled to open on Dec. 13, officials said during a tour of the facility this week.
Officials have been working on the facility, located adjacent to the 141-year-old current Saint Joseph Hospital, since May 2011.
SCL Health, parent company of Saint Joseph Hospital, will own the facility, but the hospital will share operational resources with National Jewish, giving that nationally known pulmonology center an inpatient hospital while offering Saint Joseph officials access to a steadier stream of acute patients.
At 831,000 square feet, the $623 million facility is smaller than the current 1.1-million-square-foot hospital, and its licensed-bed capacity will fall from 565 to 400, Saint Joseph Hospital President and CEO Bain Farris said.
But as hospital systems transition less-acute patients to outpatient settings like ambulatory surgery centers, the new facility will update the capability to treat sicker patients as it replaces buildings that were built in 1910, 1932 and 1964 on Saint Joseph's Denver campus.
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