By Vincent Mariel P. Galang
Reporter
CONSTRUCTION ON the St. Luke’s Medical Center in Davao City is expected to start by mid-year, according to its president and CEO.
“In the middle of this year, we’re going to start construction in Davao City. Why we chose Davao because we got a good deal in Davao and we’re going to put up a facility because our market survey tells us that there is potential for serving a lot of people from Davao,” Dr. Arturo S. De La Peña, president and chief executive officer of St. Luke’s Medical Center, told BusinessWorld in a recent interview.
“Looking also at the number of patients coming from Mindanao, so we’d rather bring the hospital, the expertise, and the technology in Davao,” he added.
The new facility will rise within Ayala Land, Inc.’s waterside estate Azuela Cove in Lanang, Davao City. The 12-storey medical center will have 250 beds, expandable to 350 beds depending on demand. It is expected to open by 2022.
The Davao facility will be the first St. Luke’s Medical Center to operate outside of Metro Manila.
For St. Luke’s Medical Center in Quezon City, Mr. De La Peña said they are planning a new building for diagnostics, operating rooms, and the like.
“Ginawa ito [This was made], more than 60 years ago, and then it was expanded depending on the needs of the hospital… When you design a particular hospital now you will have to take into consideration patient flow, and touch points. Dapat [It should be] patient friendly, but in here because it was expanded in batches, hindi maganda ‘yung patient flow [patient flow is not good]… Meron kang [You have a] test, doon pa sa isang [still there in the other] building. Hindi isang diretso [It’s not linear],” he said.
“We’re going to redevelop this. At the back of this hospital, we’re going to build a new building. Ililipat naming lahat du’n ‘yung mga [We are going to transfer] diagnostics, operating rooms, and so on and so forth, and once that has become operational, ito ire-refurnish [this will be refurnished]… traffic flow will be redesigned,” Mr. De La Peña added.
However, he said the redevelopment of St. Luke’s Medical Center in Quezon City is still in the planning stage.
“We are now doing the concept design for Quezon City, and by second week of March, we might finish the concept design, which we are going to present to the construction committee, and once that is approved, we will begin construction,” Mr. De La Peña said.

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