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The new Prentice Women's Hospital is a 950,000 square foot, 17-story hospital dedicated to providing health services for women at all phases of life.
The state-of-the-art facility will be among the top three birthing centers in the nation, with the capacity for over 13,000 births per year, and one
of the largest centers for special-care infants.
Occupying a full city block in downtown Chicago, the urban setting posed unique challenges due to site constraints, existing utilities and adjacent
structures. Because it is a replacement hospital constructed on the site of a former building, the location of existing foundations was also an important consideration.
A variety of program elements are vertically stacked due to the site's relatively small footprint. Hospital functions include patient rooms, labor and delivery
rooms and a neonatal intensive care nursery. Diagnostic suites and a breast cancer center required accommodating MRI equipment and linear accelerators, which were
located below grade to minimize the impact on the steel framing. The facility also includes column-free public spaces such as an extensive conference center, auditorium and cafeteria.
The structural system is composed of concrete shear walls at the two elevator cores to resist wind loads, and a structural steel frame to support gravity loads.
The foundation system consists of belled caissons bearing on stiff clay at 90 feet below grade. The building skin has precast concrete and glass curtain wall elements.
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