World-class health complex to rise in Pasig City

The Medical City, the fourth largest tertiary care hospital in the Philippines, has begun construction of a multi-billion peso world-class health complex at an initial cost of P2.1 billion. The health care complex will rise on a 1.5 hectare plot inside the Meralco Compound in Pasig City. Once completed, it will be the largest of its kind in the country.

Alfredo R.A. Bengzon MD, The Medical City president and CEO, said that at least 500 beds will be opened at the start of operations in mid-2003, and at full expansion of 770 beds. The new treatment and diagnostic center, which is laid out in 16 floors, will rise on a 41,000 sq.m. total floor area. The first seven will have a podium and will house diagnostic, intervention and administrative services, while the next nine will house patients.

The Medical City is presently located at the corner of San Miguel Avenue, Lourdes St. and St. Francis St., in Mandaluyong City. From a 93-bed general hospital built in 1964, The Medical City has grown into a full-service medical center with 432 beds.

According to Bengzon, The New Medical City is "more of a health complex than a traditional hospital," with the needs of patients foremost in mind.

The design team for the hospital pools local and international expertise. Spearheading the effort is Francisco Mañosa and Partners, a leading architectural firm in the Philippines. They are allied with Flad and Associates from the US as medical planners, ECRI from Pennsylvania as the medical equipment consultants, Gregory Asia from the UK as the MEP Engineers, Antonio Gutierrez from the Philippines as the project managers and Davis Langdon & SEAH of the UK, as the quantity surveyors.

The hospital building is physically integrated with the Medical Arts Tower of 20 floors, housing 250 doctors' clinics and offices. Basement parking provide for 840 parking lots.

Another tower is dedicated to nursing with each floor specifically designed for a particular branch of medicine, from pediatric to surgery, from general medicine to obstetrics and gynecology.

The New Medical City health complex project also considers the establishment of the Ateneo School of Medicine and Public Health, which rises on donated land next to the hospital.

"Taking on the challenge of leadership in the health sector can indeed be quite daunting," he told guests at the recent groundbreaking ceremonies. "But with strategic partners like Lopez Group and my beloved Ateneo de Manila University, we know we will prevail."

Meantime, he said, over the course of the year 2000, The Medical City will launch at least one new service every month. "Each fresh development represents a part of The New Medical City that we are constructing," he remarked.

He said TMC is not a stand-alone facility but functions as the hub of a network complementing ambulatory care facilities, already in Antipolo and Pasig and expanding to other communities.

The hospital had earlier established four special task forces for cardiovascular, cancer, neurosciences, and organ transplantation, fields in which it had demonstrated unique competitive advantages.

"It is the patient -- not technology, the physician or even the investor -- who is ultimately the reason for our existence. We wish to express our vision to place the patient on center stage by providing service of greater worth," Bengzon said.