Over the second half of last year, the Government of Manitoba, in a series of announcements, pledged a historic $812 million capital investment towards building, expanding and renovating health care facilities across the province.
Announcements so far have focused on Portage la Prairie and Neepawa, where new hospitals are to be built, as well as significant upgrades and expansions at sites in Brandon, Steinbach, Selkirk and Morden/Winkler.
The most ambitious project is the new hospital in Portage. The city of about 13,000, located approximately 25 kilometres west of Winnipeg, is slated for a new $283-million, two-storey hospital that will be at least double the size of the existing facility. The new hospital will include a minimum of 90 acute care inpatient beds, increased day surgery capacity, an expanded emergency department, a trauma room, stretcher bay and an ambulance bay and more space for a number of inpatient and outpatient programs.
The new hospital for the community of Neepawa in western Manitoba (300 kilometres northwest of Winnipeg) is scheduled to cost at least $127 million. The new facility is expected to be twice the size of the current site and feature at least 60 acute care inpatient beds as well as an expanded emergency department with trauma room, stretcher bay and an ambulance bay, and more room for surgery, diagnostics and palliative care along with various outpatient services including dialysis and chemotherapy.
In Brandon, Manitoba’s second-largest city, the Brandon Regional Health Centre and Western Manitoba Cancer Centre will be undergoing a nearly $70 million expansion and renovation that will add 30 new medicine beds, a new intensive care unit and renovations and an expansion to the existing neonatal intensive care unit.
As well, the adjacent Western Manitoba Cancer Centre will get a 650-square-metre expansion and a new medical linear accelerator for external beam radiation treatments.
In southeastern Manitoba, the Bethesda Regional Health Centre, serving Steinbach and the surrounding area, is getting a $32 million expansion and upgrade that will include 23 more acute care in-patient beds and expanded medical capacity, a new renal dialysis unit and pharmacy upgrades that support the delivery of chemotherapy services and establish Bethesda as a regional hub for cancer services.
Boundary Trails Health Centre – the hospital that serves the fast-growing twin systems of Winkler and Morden is southwestern Manitoba – is slated to receive $64.4 million in funding for a two-stage expansion that includes renovations to the existing building to create space for several departments and programs, including surgery as well as a building addition to house 24 inpatient beds and accommodate enhanced nursery capacity.
Finally, in Selkirk, just north of Winnipeg, the government is investing $31.6 million to expand the Selkirk Regional Health Centre, positioning the facility to play an increased role in the provincial surgery program while continuing to serve the emergency and urgent care needs of patients in the Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority. The expansion will add 30 more acute care inpatient beds.
“We are still in the planning stages for these projects,” says Transformation Capital Program Lead Scott Stephanson. “We have engaged Manitoba’s architectural and construction consultant community for the different projects. Early onboarding of construction managers on key projects through the planning and preconstruction phases has helped our team to understand and guide these projects through these important phases.”
Stephanson reports through an open request for proposal call PCL Constructors Canada has been awarded the contract for Construction Management Services for the new Portage Hospital.
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