Friendship Hospital for Animals Expansion

Overview 

Marking the second outpost of the animal hospital, three floors totaling 30,000 square feet within a 1980s former office building were converted to provide furry patients with an advanced level of care. The new hospital location occupies the lower three floors of the building, with parking below and residential units above. 

We provided structural and acoustic, noise and vibration services for the project. The hospital’s new location, which is close to the existing Friendship Hospital for Animals facility, is dedicated to surgery and treatment, featuring high-end equipment such as a linear accelerator, MRI and CT machine. 

Highlights 

• The expansion enables the hospital to offer additional specialty services and a state-of-the-art operating suite with advanced technology, while the original location will continue to offer primary care, rehab and behavior services.
• The linear accelerator required five-foot-six-inch-thick concrete walls for radiation shielding, as well as rebuilding the floor and ceiling with lead bricks to protect the surgical suites above and the parking garage below. The heavy lead and concrete shielding necessitated the addition of unique structural elements, including new steel tubes, steel girders, CMU load-bearing walls and concrete walls to create a new structural load path. Additionally, the existing foundations were strengthened to support the extra heavy loads.
• Beyond these modifications, hung steel structures were added to the existing concrete floors to support new surgical booms and lights.
• The project also involved creating new slab openings and installing mechanical equipment, including a new generator and several rooftop units. These were evaluated both for their weight impact on the structure (with appropriate strengthening added) and for acoustics, to ensure the new units would not disturb residents on the floors above.