Scripps Health hospital’s new $664M tower is now open

The smallest patients at Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla now have a big new building.

Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla has opened its new North Tower, a $664 million project that took years of planning. (Image: Lawrence Anderson/HGA)

The Scripps Health hospital in San Diego has opened its new North Tower, a $664 million building that has been in the planning stages for years. The eight-story building offers 188 new inpatient rooms for mothers and babies. All of the inpatient rooms are private.

Scripps Health officials say the new building offers expanded services for babies and expecting mothers, including 18 private labor and delivery rooms, 24 beds for neonatal intensive care, and 38 post-partum beds.

The hospital continues to utilize Rady Children’s Health for specialized services for the NICU unit, a partnership that has been in place for more than three decades.

Chris Van Gorder, president and CEO of Scripps Health, says the new building represents “innovative collaboration among our exceptional physicians, nurses and hospital employees.”

“The North Tower is a cutting-edge medical resource, and it will be a place of healing for generations to come,” he said in a statement.

The first patients were moved into the North Tower from the campus’ Browning Building earlier this month. The tower also offers inpatient services for cancer, stroke, spinal injuries and trauma.

The new building offers more capacity for Scripps La Jolla, boosting its total bed count by more than 100 beds. The hospital now offers a total of 495 beds licensed to Scripps, and another 36 NICU beds licensed to Rady Children’s.

The hospital typically delivers about 3,200 babies annually.

Architecture firm HGA designed the 420,000-square-foot tower, which was meant to incorporate more collaborative spaces and allow staff to work more efficiently. Hospital officials said the building was designed to incorporate natural light and enable families to be as comfortable as possible. Patient rooms offer views of the mountains nearby and windows stretching from the floor to the ceiling.

Scott Laoboonmi, principal and senior project manager for HGA’s Healthcare Practice Group, said in a statement that the tower is among the firm’s largest healthcare projects in California.

“It was crucial that this tower was designed to be both efficient and consistent with Scripps’ campus-wide standards for care and comfort,” Laoboonmi said in a statement.

The planning and construction of the new tower took eight years.

Jane O’Donnell, MD, medical director of the Rady Children’s at Scripps La Jolla NICU, said more than 500 babes are admitted to the NICU each year.

“We’re so thankful for this beautiful new space to provide advanced, compassionate care for the smallest and most fragile babies that deliver at Scripps,” O’Donnell said in a statement.

Hospital officials also tout the building’s decentralized nursing stations, that allow nurses to be more accessible to patients and families. Each floor also offers lobby space for families to relax, while still being close to loved ones in their rooms.

The new tower marks another step in a 25-year plan to transform the La Jolla campus. Scripps Health is undertaking other ambitious plans. The hospital is planning to build a new, $1.2 billion medical complex, featuring a hospital and an ambulatory facility on a 13-acre site in San Marcos, about 35 miles from San Diego.