"Builder Gets $400 Million Job - Robins & Morton to erect `safest hospital'", (c) Dawn Kent, Birmingham News, 5/22/07

"Birmingham-based Robins & Morton has been chosen as the general contractor for a new teaching hospital in Boca Raton, Fla., a $400 million-plus project that is one of the most expensive in health care under way in the United States. Boca Raton Community Hospital, slated to open in 2012, also is being billed as the "world's safest hospital" because of special features aimed at preventing accidents and mistakes by medical staff.  read more...

Each of the hospital's 530 rooms will be standardized, meaning the placement of medical equipment will be identical to improve efficiency and avoid confusion, said Robin Savage, Robins & Morton's chief operating officer, and Rocky McMichen, senior vice president and division manager for the company's Florida division.

In addition, orientation of beds in the large private rooms will allow caregivers to approach the right side of each patient - a technique taught in medical school.

Other features aimed at improving patient safety target worker fatigue. For instance, nurses' stations will be smaller and closer to patients' rooms, cutting down on walking back and forth.

Non-slip floors, hand rails and low-flow heating and cooling systems that create less noise also are planned for the 1.2 million-square-foot facility.

The safety features are an example of evidence-based design, a recent trend in hospital construction that uses research to direct blueprint development.

"Our whole company is excited about doing a project of this caliber and this cutting edge," Savage said.

The hospital, the country's first new academic medical center in about 10 years, is a collaboration among Florida Atlantic University, the hospital's foundation and the University of Miami's Miller School of Medicine.

Robins & Morton expects an October groundbreaking at the 38-acre site on FAU's Boca Raton campus. Dallas-based HKS Architects is designing the facility.

Robins & Morton, which also has division offices in Orlando, Dallas and Nashville, has completed more than 750 health care facilities in 28 states. The company has more than 60 projects under way across the country.