It is being celebrated as “a place of firsts.” On Nov. 13, The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio proudly dedicated the new $472 million UT Health San Antonio Multispecialty and Research Hospital in front of leaders from The University of Texas System, UT Health San Antonio and Mays Cancer Center, as well as donors, elected officials and other distinguished guests.
Click here to watch the video of the dedication ceremony highlights.
The new hospital will be the only facility of its kind in South Texas where patients will have access to therapies and expertise unavailable elsewhere, including access to top specialists and pioneering therapies, especially in cancer treatment. Uniquely designed to deliver innovative care for the most complex diseases, the hospital embodies a patient- and family-centered approach, delivering exceptional outcomes through a commitment to personalized, compassionate care and groundbreaking research.
The eight-story hospital, located at 8311 Ewing Halsell Drive in San Antonio’s Medical Center, will open on Dec. 10, focused on enhancing access to advanced medical care for patients throughout South Texas.
“We will focus on delivering patient-centered innovation, where every therapy and research effort will be designed with each patient’s unique needs in mind,” said Robert Hromas, MD, FACP, acting president of UT Health San Antonio. “This isn’t just a hospital; it’s a place that will offer individualized, life-changing treatments, with the medical expertise of our more than 1,600 medical providers.”
The hospital will serve as a destination for patients needing both routine surgeries and highly specialized procedures, from neurosurgery and spine and vascular surgeries to therapies for cancer, orthopaedics, sports medicine and urology.
“As we dedicate this new multispecialty and research hospital, we are establishing a new frontier in health care excellence for complex surgeries, advanced cancer treatment and groundbreaking clinical research that will transform the patient experience for the people of San Antonio and the entire region of South Texas,” said UT System Chancellor James B. Milliken. “This investment was the vision of [William L. Henrich, MD, MACP] who led this university for 15 years with great distinction. This hospital was his dream, and I feel so fortunate to be here today to be able to help dedicate it. We are all deeply grateful for what Bill did for UT Health Science Center San Antonio, for the UT System, for the city of San Antonio, for the state of Texas. His vision made this possible.”
With early-phase clinical trials for cancer and other diseases, patients will benefit from the most innovative research being conducted in South Texas. At full operation, the hospital will house advanced interventional radiology, a specialized intensive care unit and an integrated imaging center that connects directly with 12 operating rooms to provide surgeons access to essential imaging and data directly to the operating room team.
“This this hospital embodies a bold and forward-looking vision to provide San Antonio with the highest level of precision-based health care right here in our own city,” said James C. “Rad” Weaver, vice chairman of the UT System Board of Regents. “No longer will families have to travel outside of our community to access top tier care. Instead they will they will find groundbreaking treatments and innovations, including advanced cancer care, under this very roof.”
Patients will have access to advanced immunologic and stem cell therapies for cancer, including bone marrow transplants and CAR-T cell therapy. A skybridge connects the hospital to the Mays Cancer Center, home of the UT Health San Antonio MD Anderson Cancer Center, to allow direct access for patients and providers to the hospital.
“The new hospital allows us to extend the exceptional outpatient care already offered by Mays Cancer Center and UT Health Physicians into the inpatient setting – delivering comprehensive, seamless care across the full spectrum of our patients’ needs,” said Jeff Flowers, MBA, FACHE, the hospital’s inaugural chief executive officer.
“From the patient and family perspective, a major advantage is knowing they’ll receive advanced, state-of-the-art care that is among the best in the country, right here in San Antonio,” he said. “Cancer patients, in particular, will have access to hundreds of clinical trials and a team of specialized experts, including those focused on cancers that deeply affect this community, like liver, lung, breast and prostate cancers.”
Beyond exceptional health care, the hospital will bring 800 high-quality jobs to the city and, over time, add hundreds of medical trainees, including medical residents, fellows and nursing students.
Closing the event, Carmen Tafolla, PhD, 2015-2016 state poet laureate of Texas and inaugural San Antonio poet laureate, and a former cancer patient, shared her cancer journey.
“I learned much on that journey,” she said. “I learned that every one of those treatments was helpful, healthy and empowering. But I learned most that the community of people around me was one of my biggest tools in helping me fight and win this battle because they lent me strength when I was weak, held me up when I couldn’t stand on my own. It’s not just medicine, diet and exercise that affect a person’s health, but also environment, physical and emotional.”
She likened the hospital and the health care community to a blanket of hope that will warm generations to come.
“When UT Health asked me to write a poem for the dedication of this very special hospital, I thought first about the beautiful community of doctors, researchers fellow patients and health care workers that would create this healing environment,” she said. “I thought about the power of hope, of sunlight after a storm, of green and growing solutions blossoming with new possibilities and new discoveries. I thought about the many storms of life that each of us will have to face in our own lives in our own way. I thought of all of those, living or dead, who have helped make this moment, this dedication of a beautiful ambiente de esperanza, possible. Those who with their words, or their faith, or their sweat or their donations or their commitment to their calling, their dedication of their life’s work, have warmed our storm worries with golden rays of hope. I thought of you.”
For more information, go to www.UTHealthSAHospital.org.
Watch video of the dedication.