Building the world’s best children’s hospital
The new children’s hospital was built in Meilahti, Helsinki, during 2014-2018. The construction work was supported by private funding and donations. The support association of the project collected one-fifth of the costs of the entire construction project, in addition to which the project was funded by HUS and the state of Finland. The hospital was introduced in stages at the end of 2018, and it was awarded with the Finland prize of architecture in the first year. Projektiyhdistys ry awarded it as the Project of the Year 2018.
The challenge of the project was increased by the fact that the new hospital was designed within an existing hospital area. Therefore, deliveries to the construction site also had to be scheduled very precisely. Samuel Rutanen was one of the project participants from ETS NORD.
In the new children’s hospital, our strength was the delivery reliability, Rutanen says. Construction on a cramped construction site requires quick reactions from the supplier, as the situation on the construction site may change even quickly. We were able to deliver goods from our regional warehouse in one day, says Rutanen.
The new children’s hospital focuses on demanding special care for children. The eight-story building consists of 118 rooms with windows and 140 beds. There are seven operation theatres in the new children’s hospital. The hospital treats patients from newborns to 15-year-olds, sometimes older, all over from Finland. The treatment of many demanding diseases, such as organ transplants and heart surgery, will also take place in the new children’s Hospital in future.
