Community leaders, health care providers, and Indiana University faculty, staff, and students gathered last Tuesday, January 16, to celebrate the official ceremonial groundbreaking of the new IU Health Regional Academic Health Center on the campus of Indiana University Bloomington.

Expected to be completed in 2020, the more than 700,000-square-foot complex will serve Bloomington and the surrounding region and will include a cancer center, surgical services, a women’s center, neonatal intensive care, physician offices, and a trauma center. A state-of-the-art health care simulation center used to train students and clinicians on new patient care techniques will be shared by IU Health and IU.

It will also include a new 115,000-square-foot IU Academic Health Sciences Building, which will consolidate most of the academic health science programs on the IU Bloomington campus, including those in medicine, nursing, social work, and speech and hearing, and will include a new program in dentistry.

Leaders from IU Health and IU praised the announcement as the beginning of a new era in health care in Bloomington and the surrounding region.

“This is truly a transformational day in the history of Indiana University Health—a day that sees us fulfilling a commitment to the community of Bloomington and the entire southern region of Indiana, while at the same time marking the launch of a new and different model of care that will shape how future care is delivered across the IU Health system,” said Dennis Murphy, president and CEO of IU Health.

The new state-of-the-art facility will bring together multiple medical specialties and outpatient services into one convenient setting. It will also provide a unique and innovation-driven environment in which IU and IU Health can partner to teach future generations of health care professionals.

“Today is a truly historic day for Bloomington and southern Indiana and heralds a completely new era in health care in this region,” said IU President Michael A. McRobbie. “The Regional Academic Health Center will bring together in one complex IU Health physicians, clinicians, and medical staff with Indiana University faculty, staff, and students in a way that will enhance and broaden the services the center provides and that will substantially expand the capacity for education and research by IU’s health sciences programs by collocating them in a dynamic and state-of-the-art clinical environment.”

McRobbie noted that the Academic Health Sciences Building will provide much-needed opportunities for growth for the IU Bloomington health sciences programs, especially those in medicine, nursing, social work, and speech and hearing. This will enable IU to increase the number of students in these programs, thus helping to address the acute shortage of healthcare workers in the state. When complete, it will house around 100 faculty and staff, and train about 1,000 students. He also noted that much of the funding for this building will come from Big Ten Network revenue, representing a major contribution by athletics in support of the academic mission of the university.

Work is underway to secure and prepare the site, and moving earth will begin in the next few weeks.

For additional details on the project, please visit iuhealth.org/BloomBuild/.

RENDERINGS OF THE NEW IU HEALTH REGIONAL ACADEMIC HEALTH CENTER (Courtesy images)