The Tampa General Health Behavioral Health Hospital will be Florida’s first freestanding academic medical behavioral health hospital

Construction kicked off recently on the Tampa General Health Behavioral Health Hospital, Florida’s first freestanding academic medical behavioral health hospital. The joint venture partnership between Tampa General (a 1,040-bed facility) and Lifepoint Behavioral Health will provide a full range of inpatient and outpatient care in specialized units for pediatrics, adolescents, adults, and geriatrics, and fills a glaring medical need in the area.

The four-story, 83,000-sf hospital will accommodate 96 to 120 inpatient beds. Services for patients with behavioral health issues that are compounded by other medical conditions will be provided in dedicated units.

The hospital will have close ties with Tampa General’s nationally recognized Neuroscience Institute, which provides a wide range of care to patients with neurological disorders. Medical students and resident physicians will receive training from faculty affiliated with University of South Florida (USF) Health Morsani College of Medicine.

“This new hospital will help raise the level of mental health care across the Tampa Bay area,” says Glenn Currier, MD, professor, and chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience in the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine. “A facility like this, dedicated to patients with behavioral and mental health conditions, especially those experiencing acute crises or complex conditions, will be an incredible asset. This specialized hospital will also ease the burden on area emergency rooms, which take in the bulk of psychiatric emergencies but have few options for the inpatient care that is so critical for successful management of many behavioral and mental health conditions.”

The conditions that will be treated at the facility are complex, but the structural concept is straightforward—a simple concrete foundation with a steel structure. The exterior will be composed of exterior insulation finishing system (EIFS), masonry, metal wall panels, and large curtainwall window systems spanning multiple floors. Materials and colors will complement Tampa General Hospital’s existing network of buildings on the campus and throughout the city. A thin brick/masonry veneer engineered system (MVES) will be installed using pre-fabricated wall panels.

Located in downtown Tampa, adjacent to a new Tampa General Rehabilitation Hospital, TGH Behavioral Health Hospital will bolster Tampa’s burgeoning medical district. The facility is expected to open in late 2024.

The facility was made possible, in part, by funding from the state of Florida to address the state's growing mental health crisis. This past legislative session, Senator Jay Collins and Representative Lawrence McClure secured $10 million in the state budget to support the construction of the TGH Behavioral Health Hospital, according to TGH.

Owner and/or developer: Tampa General Hospital
Design architect: Stengel Hill Architecture
Architect of record: Stengel Hill Architecture
MEP engineer: CMTA, Inc.
Structural engineer: Skyhook Structural Engineering
General contractor/construction manager: JE Dunn Construction

During the second week of November, the architecture firm NBBJ launched a podcast series called Uplift, that focuses on the transformative power of design. Its first 30-minute episode homed in on designing for behavioral healthcare facilities, a hot topic given the increasing number of new construction and renovation projects in this subsector.

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