Abbott Northwestern opens 10

Abbott Northwestern Hospital $1B expansion

A new 10-story hospital tower at Abbott Northwestern is adding rooms, technology and new care spaces in south Minneapolis.

The new Richard M. Schulze Surgical and Critical Care Center, attached to Abbott Northwestern in south Minneapolis, includes 190 hospital rooms — 50 more than the old hospital.

5 EYEWITNESS NEWS Kevin Doran sat down with Whitney Johnson, Vice President of Operations at Abbott.

Kevin Doran: “So this is the Phillips neighborhood, one of the most economically disadvantaged in Minneapolis. Why would Allina invest a billion dollars here?”

Whitney Johnson: “Allina Health has been invested in the Phillips community for over 140 years, and we certainly have no intent to stop investing in this community, which was a big driver of the project. We hire employees from this neighborhood, we train staff from this neighborhood, and of course, we take care of patients in this neighborhood. So, we’re very much committed to it, and have been for many, many years.”

The rooms include AI technology such as digital patient boards, TVs and cameras for telehealth and education. The hospital also says the system can monitor patients to help prevent falls.

“This technology will watch a patient’s movements, and if a patient flips their leg off the side of the bed, they’re still in bed, they’re not falling yet, but they’re on their way. That will alert a nurse or an aide, ‘Hey, Jean, in that room is about to get up, we got to do something,'” Dr. Jean Watson said.

The tower also has 30 new operating rooms. Some include an MRI scanner that moves between surgical suites, and the building uses pneumatic tubes to move garbage off-site.

Also inside the new building is a robot elevator that comes through a tunnel three blocks away, loaded with medical supplies, bedding, and food.

The project also includes features meant to make patients and families more comfortable, including a mural on the ceiling of the emergency department parking area, natural lighting and a rooftop healing garden.

“This project hits every single difficult box that you could check,” Mike Labukas said.

Labukas, with Mortenson Construction, has managed crews of more than 1,000 people for the past six years. He said the work happened while keeping the Abbott Northwestern campus operating.

“But it’s an urban site, it’s a tight site. We had skyways, we have tunnels, but most importantly, we have the mission to keep the entire Abbott Northwestern campus live, running unimpacted at all times during the construction of this new hospital,” Labukas said.

As for how construction potentially impacted healthcare costs for patients, Johnson said, “There were many design decisions that went into this project that included incorporating technology and automation, that ultimately allow us to be more efficient.”

Allina Health says that efficiency helps it deliver high-quality care in a cost-effective way.