First Three Floors of Kelowna’s Surgical Centre Will Soon Be Open to Patients

Plenary Health handed over a ceremonial key for the first three floors of the new Interior Heart and Surgical Centre on Friday.

This ceremonial handing over marks the completed construction of the first three floors of the top-notch facility. Now that Interior Health has the keys to the building, over 700 of their employees, physicians, and volunteers will begin building orientation and training. In the next few months, new equipment, computers, and furniture will also be installed.

The ceremonial key to the new Interior Heart and Surgical Centre. (Photo Credit: KelownaNow)

In 2012, Interior Health chose Plenary Health to design, build, finance, and maintain the new Interior Heart and Surgical Centre (IHSC). The partnership is not over with the ceremonial handing over of the key, as Johnson Controls (included in Plenary Health) will provide facility maintenance service for the new building until 2045.

The construction started 34 months ago and finished on budget and on schedule. The new facility is 152,000 square feet and has a state-of-the-art surgical unit with the capacity for 15 operating rooms, including two cardiac operating rooms and a Hybrid operating room. The IHSC will also have 45 private pre-operative patient rooms, a new and expanded medical device reprocessing (sterilization) department, and a new perinatal (before/after birth) unit that will have its own operating room for elective C-sections (opening in spring 2016).

Interior Health Board Chair Erwin Malzer was thrilled to see the new modern building. (Photo Credit: KelownaNow)

“Besides the surgeries that are going to be done here, the benefit to families is that their loved ones will no longer have to be transported in many cases to the coast,” said Kelowna­–Lake Country MLA Norm Letnick. “Families will be closer to their loved ones as they’re being helped right here in the Central Okanagan.”

“This is not just a Kelowna facility,” said Letnick. “This is an IH [Interior Health] facility that’s going to be serving the Interior of British Columbia.”

One of the new operating rooms in the facility (Photo Credit: KelownaNow)

“We are very proud to celebrate the successful construction of this phase of the new Interior Heart and Surgical Centre, on time and on budget,” said Sean Brock, Vice President and District Manager, PCL Constructors Westcoast Inc.. “We could not have done it without the dedication, expertise and support of so many local partners, suppliers, and especially the men and women, ‘the builders’, who worked on the site every day, who ensured the success of this project.”

“We truly hope that all the professionals who work in this building enjoy it as much as the professionals who built it.”

Patient care rooms on the first floor of the building (Photo Credit: KelownaNow)

These first three floors of the Interior Heart and Surgical Centre will finally open to the public on September 28, 2015.