New Building Dedicated to Patient Care
LUBBOCK - Texas Tech University System regents, Chancellor Kent Hance and Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center President John Baldwin, M.D., celebrated the official ribbon cutting ceremony of Lubbock’s newest building dedicated to patient care on Dec. 13 at the new Texas Tech Physicians Medical Pavilion in Lubbock.
Also speaking at the event was the Honorable Robert Duncan, Texas State Senator for District 28, Regent Rick Francis, chairman for the Facilities Committee and Steven Berk, M.D., dean of the School of Medicine.
The Texas Tech Physicians Medical Pavilion includes the clinical practices of Surgery, Orthopaedics, Pediatrics, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Internal Medicine, Family and Community Medicine and Ophthalmology.
Steven Berk, M.D., said this facility will provide patients a modern, patient-focused and patient-friendly health care experience.
“The Texas Tech Univeristy Health Sciences Center building opened in 1976 and more than 30 years later our commitment continues to be for the patients we serve,” Berk said. “The School of Medicine is proud to serve West Texas and the Pavilion will provide one of the best facilities available.”
President Baldwin said the institution continues to search for ways to improve patient care.
“The Health Sciences Center has grown dramatically over the years. But our goal is not growth for growth’s sake. This is about providing exceptional patient care for our community.”
The pavilion includes a curtain wall artwork called “DNA,” which is made of cold cast glass. The architectural art glass fabricated in association with Derix Glasstudios in Taunusstein, Germany, was designed by international artist Shan-Shan Sheng.
Sheng came of age during China’s Cultural Revolution, a tumultuous experience that still drives the emotionality of her work. She created two works of art for the Medical Pavilion Building. Her artwork in architectural art glass extends from the first floor elevator lobby to the fourth floor. It creates a cohesive, lyrical composition when viewed from the building’s exterior, like a colorful beacon. The glass windows were first painted with expressive brush strokes in the artist’s spirited style. In contrast, a hard-edged curvilinear, ladder-like structure, recalling the DNA molecule and its protein rungs (C-G, A-T), was screened on top of the loosely painted glass surface. The rungs of this abstraction are defined by a series of short horizontal lines, which according to Sheng, were made even in length and number to bring a cohesive symmetry to the composition.
Sheng also created a three-dimensional artwork made from panels of acrylic resin,a contemporary art medium,formed and hand painted in her San Francisco studio. This complementary suspension sculpture hangs in a spiraling, DNA-like helix, in the patient reception lobbies.
Physicians practicing in the Pavilion provided services to patients in hospitals and other care delivery sites totaling approximately 185,000 clinical visits. The facility has 162 exam rooms and 15 procedure rooms.
The Texas Tech Physicians Pavilion project, which is more than 150,000 square feet, began on Nov. 15, 2004. Cost for the health care facility was $36,462,388.
The cost includes renovation of 25,500 square feet of existing HSC space, which relocated the clinical practice and faculty offices of the Department of Ophthalmology. FKP Architects Inc. from Houston designed the facility; Lee Lewis Construction Inc. of Lubbock served as the construction manager.
