New Era of Healthcare Underway at University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Medical Center – Aberdeen Campus

University of Maryland Upper Chesapeake Health recently marked the beginning of construction of its 60-acre Aberdeen campus, Maryland, with a flag raising ceremony supported by the American Legion Post #39 Honor Guard and UM UCH’s spiritual services and grounds team.

Designed and constructed by Erdman, the new campus will have a combined square footage of 220,806 feet, and will feature the following:

• Behavioral health pavilion/psychiatric hospital with inpatient behavioral health beds and a full array of critically needed inpatient and outpatient behavioral health services to serve the needs in the community.
• Freestanding medical facility with a full-service emergency department, which offers twice the square footage of the current ED at UM Harford Memorial Hospital. It will feature triage rooms, emergency treatment rooms (with dedicated emergency behavioral health treatment rooms), observation beds (short-stay medical care beds) and shell space for expansion as needed. The facility will also include a diagnostic imaging suite, laboratory, pharmacy and other hospital support services.
• Medical office building (in the existing office building) that will house offices for primary care and other medical and surgical specialties, as well as additional outpatient services such as rehabilitation services, a comprehensive imaging center and an infusion center.

In addition, the expansion of UM Upper Chesapeake Medical Center – Bel Air has begun. It includes a parking expansion project to be completed next spring and an outpatient building, which will include an ambulatory surgery center expected to open in early 2022. Three additional floors will be added above the Patricia D. and M. Scot Kaufman Cancer Center, providing an additional 80,000 square feet. One floor will have observation beds (for short stay medical care needs), one floor will have medical/surgical private rooms and one floor will be designated for future needs of the Kaufman Cancer Center and medical/surgical bed expansion.

The Aberdeen and Bel Air projects, with an estimated cost of $228 million, are designed with the community’s healthcare needs in mind and will incorporate innovative, technological capabilities for care delivered to the community.

UM Harford Memorial Hospital in Havre de Grace will continue to operate until the new Aberdeen campus and the expansion in Bel Air are complete in spring 2023.

In response to COVID-19, the medical center at the Aberdeen campus is designed to mitigate the spread of germs. Touchless technology and fixtures are part of the design. Airflow and filtration systems are also designed to best meet the needs of patients for safety and comfort.