A 44,000-sq-ft expansion brought 48 private rooms to the 11th floor of Phoenix Children’s patient tower as part of its new neonatal intensive care unit. This facility is still Arizona’s only American Academy of Pediatrics-designated Level IV NICU facility, which offers the highest level of medical care for complex neonatal conditions.

Each room is equipped for emergency and advanced treatments, while an efficient floor plan gives clinicians quick access to patients and enables easy transport to other areas.

Since the $18.4-million project was situated directly under the 12th-floor helipad, the project team performed enhanced acoustical examinations within the existing shell space to determine how to mitigate noise from emergency helicopter traffic.

Resilient channels were incorporated in corridor walls and between patient rooms, while mass-loaded insulation for mechanical systems and other strategic measures exceeded code requirements.

Photo by Kyle Zirkus

Halfway through construction, the owner decided to shift the project scope from 48 medical-surgical private patient rooms to 48 NICU patient rooms. Although the original design had already been approved by city inspectors and interior framing was underway, the team moved to create a new NICU care area with patient room shifts, on-call sleep room modifications and a completely different interior design palette.

The contractor coordinated closely with the design team and the owner to identify areas of work that could continue while design changes were pending. Once the new drawings were released, the contractor meticulously reviewed them with the design team and the owner to minimize excessive RFIs and prioritized the resubmittal process to keep the project on schedule.

To minimize the project’s impacts on active hospital operations, the team utilized a small personnel elevator crewed by a Kitchell staff member during site hours. The hospital also allocated a large elevator for material movement during early morning hours. To ensure a quiet environment for patients on the floors below, noisy activities were limited until after 8:30 a.m.

Photo by Kyle Zirkus

In active health care spaces, Kitchell adopts a “patient-first” approach, ensuring that every preconstruction and construction decision prioritizes the safety of patients. Given the build-out’s location in an active children’s hospital, ensuring the safety of workers, patients and staff was paramount. Project team members followed Infection Control Risk Assessment protocols and planned Infection Control Procedures for each phase, approved by Phoenix Children’s staff for comprehensive safety and logistical planning.

The NICU’s fire alarm system is both code-compliant and tailored to the needs of its sensitive patients. In collaboration with the fire alarm contractor and the city, Kitchell secured a variance to reduce the audio/visual elements of the fire alarm, minimizing the impact of loud sounds and flashing lights.

Despite these changes and challenges, the project was completed within budget and on schedule in February 2024.