New $239-M women’s hospital announced

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This article was published 24/06/2011 (5436 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Charlyn Olfert had a packed house when she gave birth to Sienna nine months ago at Health Sciences Centre’s Women’s Hospital.

Olfert was one of the lucky few who got a private room which she filled with her husband, a gaggle of parents and grandparents, her doctor, two nurses and a medical student. She said, even with that crowd, they were able to have a meaningful bonding experience as her daughter was born.

Hearing the plans for Winnipeg’s new $239 million women’s hospital announced Friday, Olfert said, “With all this, I think I better go home and start planning for another baby.”

“All this” are the details of the new hospital which is to replace the 60-year-old women’s pavilion at HSC, Health Minister Theresa Oswald and other officials unveiled at the site just north of HSC on Elgin Street. Olfert spoke for young mothers at the announcement.

The new hospital, at 27,871 square metres, will be more than three times the size of the current one and will boast many private rooms — “with their private bathrooms,” Oswald stressed to applause from the crowd of more than 100 people. The rooms will be larger and more home-like to help women and their families “go through that joyful, yet challenging experience of giving birth,” Oswald said.

“We had the largest consultation ever in Manitoba” to find out what women wanted in their hospital, Oswald said. “I’m very proud to say we listened.”

Private rooms topped the list of what women wanted at the new hospital. The plans will stress family-centred mother and baby units and family birthplace labour, delivery and recovery rooms.

Arlene Wilgosh, president and chief executive officer of the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, said the consultations went as far as asking for input to the look of the new rooms, right down to paint colour.

The hospital, to open in 2014, will also have an expanded state-of-the-art neonatal intensive-care unit and intermediate-care nursery for newborns who need specialty care and monitoring, a women’s surgical centre and in-patient gynaecological unit. The hospital will also expand to 173 beds, 25 per cent more than the current hospital.

Breaking ground on the hospital building coincides with the provincial government’s release of the 2011 Manitoba Women’s Health Strategy. It’s been 10 years since the last strategy was set and the new one sees a shift in attitude to health care, in particular women’s health care,

Oswald said after the official announcement. The strategy calls for a more holistic approach. Ten years ago, the plan didn’t call for midwives or nurse practitioners. Now the system has about 40 midwives and more than 100 nurse practitioners.

Plans for the new hospital won a national award of excellence in 2010 from Canadian Architect Magazine, a recognition of the design’s warmth and innovation.

julie.carl@freepress.mb.ca