Healthcare Design - May 2014 - 41

ANTON GRASSL/ESTO

MAINEGENERAL HEALTH is the amalgamation of a series of mergers
over the years that's created a system of acute care hospitals, outpatient
facilities, and home care services in Maine's Kennebec Valley. And when
the time came for leadership to address two aging inpatient sites, its
landscape was about to change again.
"We had more than $100 million in repairs that we needed to do to
the buildings just to keep them updated but not improve anything for patients," says Chuck Hays, MaineGeneral president and CEO. "Ultimately,
we decided that one new regional inpatient facility was the way to go
and started that process."
The design team of SMRT Inc. (Portland, Maine) and TRO Jung Brannen (TROJB; Boston) was brought on board in 2009 through competitive bidding for the schematic design of a 192-bed, $322 million hospital
proposed in MaineGeneral's certificate of need to the state.
However, when the project got the green light, Hays was looking at
the largest construction project in the system's history as well as in his
own career, so he wanted to make sure it was done right. Research
of similar-sized projects and their delivery methods zeroed in on what
would be another first for Hays: an integrated project delivery (IPD)
contract. "I liked the tenets of it. I saw that when it was done right, the
results are excellent. So we headed off in that direction," he says.

The hierarchy of interiors begins
with community functions at
the front of the building and
progresses inward, with the most
acute functions at the back. Each
of these departments is organized
around a central spine that
consists of public (shown) and
service corridors.

Team building
Getting from that point to the September 2013 completion of what today
is the Alfond Center for Health in Augusta, Maine, meant covering a lot of
new ground. To start, ownership had to select its IPD partners and come
to terms on a contract.
A major component of IPD as a delivery method is early integration
of all team members to streamline-and even overlap-design and
construction, but signing a shared-risk contract is what makes it more
than just a methodology. Contracts generally give partners equal stake
in both risks and rewards so that all are similarly invested in meeting
budget and schedule.
With SMRT and TROJB already on board, MaineGeneral needed a
builder and subcontractors, but the process of choosing them was a bit
different from the norm due to the inherently collaborative nature of IPD,
with the attitude of potential team members weighed alongside skill and
expertise. "Typically, you think about whether the contractors you select
are physically able to do the job. Then you assess whether the bids are
apples to apples. Then you realign all that and look at pricing. Now,
though, whether best price or not, culture came first. If they didn't have
the flexibility to embrace IPD, then it wouldn't work," Hays says.
Ultimately, a construction joint venture of Robins & Morton (Birmingham, Ala.) and HP Cummings (Portland, Maine) was chosen for the job
with a number of major subcontractors and consultants also party to the
IPD contract. However, because the process was still fairly new in 2010,
exactly how risk would be shared was up in the air.

HCDmagazine.com 06.14

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Healthcare Design - May 2014

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