EDMONTON – The Alberta budget is pledging $20 million over three years to build a standalone Stollery Children’s Hospital in Edmonton, should its 2024 budget pass.
With 236 beds, the Stollery Children’s Hospital is the second-largest children’s hospital in Canada and has among the highest inpatient volumes of any children’s hospital in Canada, a release said.
The Alberta government initially invested in the project in 2021 with $1 million matched by the Stollery Children’s Hospital Foundation. Proposed investment in the 2024 budget includes $17 million in new funding following $3 million invested through the previous year’s budget for a total government investment of $21 million over four years, the release said.
Plans for the new hospital include integrating mental health resources, virtual care, research and training facilities.
The Stollery Children’s Hospital serves families in a geographical area of more than 500,000 square kilometres from Red Deer to Alberta’s northernmost border with the Northwest Territories. Almost 40 per cent of inpatients at the Stollery come from outside the Edmonton area and the hospital is the closest and primary children’s hospital for residents of the Northwest Territories, the release said.
The Stollery Children’s Hospital, established in 2021, is a full-service pediatric hospital and centre for complex pediatric care and research and sees about 300,000 children, 55,000 emergency room visits and 12,000 surgeries annually, the release said.
At the going rate for hospital construction the 20 Million will just about pay for the hoarding around the site.