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Huge SAMMC construction project breaks ground

  • Published
  • By Maria Gallegos
  • Brooke Army Medical Center Public Affairs
FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas --  Military leaders, construction officials and wounded warriors joined together Dec. 8 to break ground for the historic start of construction on the San Antonio Military Medical Center, a $724 million construction and renovation project at Brooke Army and Wilford Hall Medical Centers.

The construction, expected to take almost three years, will unify Wilford Hall Medical Center, or SAMMC-South, and Brooke Army Medical Center, or SAMMC-North.

Lt. Gen. Eric Schoomaker, Army surgeon general, and Lt. Gen. James Roudebush, Air Force surgeon general, were guest speakers at the ceremony.

General Roudebush stressed the importance of providing the best care to all service members, retirees and their families.

"The medical capabilities that are here in the community, the leadership's view of the importance of the military and military medicine really makes San Antonio the perfect home for this kind of capability," General Roudebush said.

SAMMC-South and SAMMC-North will provide tremendous training benefits for the tactical-level medical professionals serving in the Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines and Coast Guard. SAMMC will continue to train more than 600 physician residents per year for the Army and Air Force in 37 clinical areas, all of which are already integrated, except for general surgery, which is scheduled for integration in summer 2009, and orthopedics, which is scheduled for integration in summer 2010.

The SAMMC-North campus will consist of 425 inpatient beds, 32 operating rooms for inpatient and ambulatory surgery, a Level-1 trauma/emergency room, medical, pediatric, and surgical subspecialty clinics, primary care, labor/delivery/recovery, a neonatal intensive care unit; pediatric ICU, bone marrow unit, and new centers of excellence for cardio-vascular, maternal-child and battlefield health and trauma.

SAMMC-North, including the Fort Sam Houston Primary Care Clinic, will add approximately 791,000 square feet of new construction and 314,000 square feet of renovation, with costs projected at $673 million.

Included in the new construction at SAMMC-North is the consolidated tower with the emergency department, inpatient floors, clinics and administrative space adding 738,000 square feet, a multi-level garage with 5,000 parking spaces and a central energy plant.

The SAMMC-South campus will be one of the largest ambulatory care centers in the Department of Defense and will offer primary care, around-the-clock urgent care for trainees; medical, pediatric and surgical subspecialty clinics to include allergy, dermatology, sleep disorders, chiropractic, podiatry, ENT, audiology/speech, flight medicine and oral surgery, and a new center of excellence for eye care.

SAMMC-South will add approximately 186,000 square feet of renovation with costs projected at $51 million. A replacement ambulatory surgical clinic project is currently under consideration as an alternative to the renovation project. This military construction project would construct a 645,000-square foot replacement ambulatory surgery center with costs projected at $441 million.

"The collaboration and economies of scale we achieve in combing our efforts allow us to leverage our resources and expertise in a way that we were not able to before and we will all gain from these efficiencies by enjoying better facilities, better educational opportunities and better access to care and treatment," General Schoomaker said. "I have no doubt that we will continue to reinvent ourselves to define and pursue the distinction of being world-class through joint and collaborative ventures with our sister services."

Once the integration and construction are complete, the Army and Air Force will jointly staff and operate SAMMC, with both services staffing the inpatient facility at Fort Sam Houston, north campus and the outpatient facility at Lackland Air Force Base, south campus. SAMMC replaces both WHMC and BAMC as the medical flagship for the second largest beneficiary population in the Department of Defense.

"Let there be no doubt that Army, Air Force and Navy Medicine with our Veterans Administration partners in federal medicine is, and will remain, second to none," General Schoomaker said. "Our groundbreaking today sends this message loud and clear."

Base Realignment and Closure related transition actions are scheduled to be completed by Sept. 15, 2011.

For more information on the integration of BRAC San Antonio or to get updates, logon to www.sammc.amedd.army.mil.