Middle East Report: Gaining Ground
University Hospital Dubai, UAE
Set within the massive Dubai Healthcare City (DHCC), Ellerbe Becket’s University Hospital Dubai will be a 400-bed unit with a mixture of inpatient and outpatient consultations and surgeries, imaging, laboratory and invasive procedures, and non-trauma emergency care. With 149,000 square metres (1.6m square feet) of space, it will be the main tertiary care unit within Dubai Healthcare City, adjacent and connected to the existing Harvard Medical School Dubai Centre. Owned by Tatweer Corporation (a subsidiary of Dubai Holding Company) the clinical and educational side is being developed by partners Harvard Medical International (HMI). The overarching ambition is to create a centre that will break down the traditional barriers between specialities to create truly multidisciplinary care. “It has also been designed as a learning centre,” says Greg Chang of Ellerbe Becket. “It will really be setting a standard as a teaching hospital, not just for the Middle East, but worldwide.” Ellerbe Becket has been closely involved in the design and planning of this unit, working with HMI to develop surrogate user groups whose feedback directly informed the planning and layout of the spaces. Sustainability is also high on the agenda. Ellerbe Becket is aiming for LEED certification, and if successful, will be the first hospital in the Middle East to achieve it. The design adapts traditional Islamic architectural techniques with modern building technologies in a kind of ‘Islamic fusion’. A four-storey stone base maximises temperature stability and the open double skin on the exterior features two layers of glass, one to create a comfortable interior environment and the second to act as a screen, filtering sunlight and mitigating the heat of the sun with a traditional Islamic pattern. The base draws inspiration from the traditional stone forms of wind towers and mosques found in the region. The spaces are large scale and transition seamlessly from the exterior to the interior, giving patients and visitors a clear sense of place within the context of DHCC. |
The Middle East continues to be a hotbed of construction activity – with medical facilities high up the list of priorities. Veronica Simpson reports on the potential risks and rewards for Western architectural firms involved in the building boom.
As Western economies topple towards recession, the Middle East shows no sign of a slowdown. The building boom that has come to typify this region continues unabated, and state-of-the-art medical facilities for both the growing ex-patriot populations and the wealthy residents of the United Arab Emirates are top of the wish-list.
“The opportunities to build high quality medical buildings of a variety of sizes and specialties are greater in the Middle East than anywhere else in the world right now,” says Greg Chang, principal and director of healthcare at Ellerbe Becket, which has been operating in the UAE since 1999. It is currently working alongside world leading university medical partners such as Cornell and Harvard to create facilities that address both design and functionality issues head-on.
Where Asia is largely looking for 1,000-bed mega-hospitals, the Middle East offers a wider range, from small speciality units of 100 beds upwards. Chang adds that it’s not only the buildings but also the institutions that are being constructed afresh: “Unlike in the US or Europe, where there’s a lot of institutional memory, there’s a real opportunity [in the Middle East] to do something new.”
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University Hospital Dubai, UAE
Contract: Project Partnering Contract
Project completion date: February 2011
Client: Dubai Healthcare City
Design architect: Ellerbe Becket
Architect of record: GHD
Structural engineer: GHD
Services engineer: Ellerbe Becket / SKM
Quantity surveyor: Davis Langdon
Main contractor: ANLOR
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Risks and rewards
But, as anyone who’s had any dealings with the region knows, this is no El Dorado. There are just as many risks as there are opportunities, and consultants can spend years and frightening amounts of money chasing after ‘dead cert’ projects only for them to vanish into thin air – or, worse still, for the major part of the contracts to be awarded to cheaper, local firms, once all the sweat and hard work has gone into the masterplan.
Those with a track record in the region, and who have made careful partnerships with the right developers and consultants, are certainly reaping the rewards. There are interesting new opportunities to create cutting-edge facilities that take the best of the West’s ideas and, in some cases, add to them.
Like Ellerbe Becket, NBBJ is one of those long active in the region – though only recently establishing a permanent office there – with several projects underway. It recently completed a $38m flagship diabetic facility in Kuwait, the Dasman Center for the Treatment and Research of Diabetes, which includes dedicated fitness facilities plus a kitchen where patients’ family or staff can be re-trained to cook delicious but diabetic-friendly food.
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Flagship: The $38m Dasman Centre for the Treatment and Research of Diabetes in Kuwait
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Still in the pipeline are a 1,000-bed hospital within a massive ‘health city’ just outside the Yemeni capital, utilising a combination of vernacular and cutting-edge architectural techniques to minimise environmental impact, plus a state-of-the-art hospital in Sharjah that combines the highest clinical care with five-star spa facilities and styling.
High-end hospitality
As governments, developers and investors seek to create globally competitive healthcare provision, it is Canadian, North American, British, Australian and German medical and architectural firms that seem to dominate the expertise being brought in from abroad. InterHealth Canada (IHC) has been active as a consultancy in the region since 1999, and manages and operates hospital facilities throughout the UAE.
Where the opportunity arises, IHC likes to be involved in the planning and provision for new hospitals, and recently worked from concept to handover on a maternity hospital project in Kuwait with NBBJ that takes patient care to a new level.
The Royale Hyatt Center for Women’s Health couples top-end private medical care with levels of hospitality that cater
specifi cally for the Middle Eastern market, where births are celebrated as lavishly as weddings. With 49 private postpartum rooms, 18 labour and delivery rooms, 12 recovery rooms, six paediatric rooms, four operating theatres, six special care baby units, an outpatient clinic and comprehensive ancillary services, its resources are enviable.
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The Al Hassawi Medical Facility, Sharjah
Fawzia Mubarak Al Hassawi has conceived a unique five-star hospital as a memorial to her father, Mubarak Al Hassaawi. The family’s solid background in the development of fi ve-star hotels in the region means the luxury hospitality side of the project is assured. NBBJ has been appointed to provide architecture and masterplanning, bringing in additional Canadian and German clinical consultancy input, to create a fusion of cutting-edge medical practice with the most advanced complementary medical healing practices within a luxurious environment. Spa interiors specialist Syntax is also involved in the public areas. A low-level facility with ample landscaping and privacy for inpatients has been designed to occupy a 32,500 square-metre (350,000 square-foot) site. The plan is for an assortment of layered buildings, no higher than three storeys, with multiple roof gardens and terraces disguising the lower fl oors. Some areas have been sunk below the landscaping to minimise the complex’s visual impact and maximise sustainability, through passive cooling techniques. Therapeutic gardens surround the rehabilitation and treatment blocks, with water features and planting to maximise shade. Situated on the side of the main highway to Dubai, the hospital is shielded from the road by a large medical offi ce block, and at the rear by an L-shaped leisure and retail facility. Staff residential facilities, a hotel and extensive leisure and retail facilities are also part of the scheme, unified by NBBJ’s exterior treatment which uses a double-skin glazed finish to maintain interior temperatures, with a decorative patterned screen shielding the building from sunlight.
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But the size of the bedrooms – which Hildebrand says compare to the average five-star luxury suite – are also scaled to
accommodate postpartum celebrations (the largest being 130 square metres/1,400 square feet); alternatively, a ballroom downstairs can accommodate a feast for 150 guests, with lifts to deliver a new mother from her private bedroom to the party without leaving her bed.
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The Al Hassawi Medical Facility
Contract form: FIDIC – unsigned
Project completion date: 2010
Cost: $900m
Client: Mubarak Al Hassawi Group
Architect: NBBJ
Associated consultants: Syntax Architects
Cost Consultants: Davis Langdon LLP
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“There is a real quest for excellence here,” says James Hildebrand, InterHealth Canada’s project director, speaking from the firm’s offices in Dubai. Being involved in a project from the early stages means IHC can make a difference to “getting the basic stuff right”, says Hildebrand, including the provision of the right number of hand-wash sinks, separate from work sinks, and in the right locations to encourage frequent use. “We managed to design in a high level of infection control to the Royale Hyatt Center,” Hildebrand adds.
Even operating on a clinical level, there are still hazards. Says Hildebrand: “When you go into a country you need to have a clear picture of supply and demand – population statistics and clinical needs. Figures like that are sketchy here, so you have to do your own analysis.”
And although there are plenty of people willing to build hospitals, there is a shortage of skilled labour to operate them, especially nurses. “There are more projects that don’t get through than those that do,” he says.
Sheikh Khalifa Specialist Hospital in Ras Al-Khaimah, UAE
Perkins Eastman has designed this 55,000 m2, 248-bed medical facility to accommodate the unique healthcare requirements in the United Arab Emirates (where whole families may need to be accommodated nearby or onsite) and is flexible enough in design to accommodate an additional 250 beds. The major specialties comprise oncology, cardiology and a trauma centre. The six-storey structure incorporates the latest international design and medical planning solutions, with materials, forms and colours inspired by the surrounding terrain, from rolling sand dunes to the rich red colouration of the surrounding desert. Groves of drought-resistant plants decorate the exterior scheme, while the interiors maintain the shades of ochre and red that typify the desert palette, with bright highlight colours in furnishings and fi ttings. The idea is to create a welcoming environment that is functional and effi cient without compromising aesthetics. Overall, the design is modern, flexible, and sensitively integrated within the natural environment.
Project completion: 2010
Cost: AED 600m
Client: The Executive Committee for Developing Rural Areas
Architect: Perkins Eastman, Al Bayaty Architects
Structural / MEPL engineer: Al Bayaty Architects
Lighting engineer: Crossey Engineering
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Middle Eastern ideas head West
As you’d expect, having a presence in the region makes all the difference – both to understanding the real opportunities, and seizing them as they arise. NBBJ principal Alistair Cory says: “Having people on the ground now, we are starting to see that investment bear fruit, in terms of being able to consolidate relationships. It is still, in some ways, a hazardous region to operate in. But it is evolving. They are realising that it is worth investing in Western expertise [throughout the process] if you want to maintain the quality of a project.”
What’s more, as Middle Eastern companies start to invest in healthcare projects outside of their region (the Jumeirah Group, owners of the defi nitive Dubai luxury hotel, the Burj Al Arab, are said to be looking at taking Middle Eastern-style luxury healthcare into Europe), it pays to have developed strong relationships with them in their own territory. Sheikh Khalifa Specialist Hospital in Ras Al-Khaimah, UAE Perkins Eastman has designed this 55,000-square-metre (592,000 square foot), 248-bed medical facility to accommodate the unique healthcare requirements in the United Arab Emirates (where whole families may need to be accommodated nearby or onsite) and is flexible enough in design to accommodate an additional 250 beds. The major specialties comprise oncology, cardiology and a trauma centre.
The six-storey structure incorporates the latest international design and medical planning solutions, with materials, forms and colours inspired by the surrounding terrain, from rolling sand dunes to the rich red colouration of the surrounding desert. Groves of drought-resistant plants decorate the exterior scheme, while the interiors maintain the shades of ochre and red that typify the desert palette, with bright highlight colours in furnishings and fi ttings. The idea is to create a welcoming environment that is functional and efficient without compromising aesthetics. Overall, the design is modern, flexible, and sensitively integrated within the natural environment.
Veronica Simpson is an architectural journalist
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