The University of New Mexico’s new hospital has been approved to add two more floors to the Critical Care Tower, which is currently under construction.
The Higher Education Department and State Board of Finance granted the extension that increases the original plan from 96 beds to 190, according to KRQE.
“We designed the foundational originally to be able to add additional towers, additional floors in the future,” Michael Chicarelli, COO of UNM Hospital, said to KRQE. “We didn’t anticipate we would need to do it so soon. The pandemic really highlighted the need for more inpatient capacity in our state.”
The shells of the extra two floors should be completed in 2024, KRQE reported. It will be another three years before the interior of those floors is constructed. UNM is expanding its physician residency program so the staff can accommodate the additional patients on a long-term basis.
The planned development of a new UNM Hospital tower was revealed in 2019, according to UNM Health's website, and construction began in early 2021. The project includes a larger parking garage with easier accessibility for arrivals and departures and a utility plant, as well as new beds.
The much-needed new hospital is being built on a 6.5-acre lot. The existing UNM Hospital normally operates above capacity, and patients can wait hours before being admitted, the UNM Health Sciences Center noted. As it is the only Level 1 trauma center in the state, people come to the hospital from all over New Mexico for treatment.