CREJ - Building Dialogue - September 2016
Veritas Management Groups’ The Center at Northridge in Westminster is a 75,700-square-foot, high-end skilled nursing and rehabilitation facility with spacious surroundings, finishes and materials that rival high-end hotels. Designed as an optimal alternative to a traditional nursing home, The Center at Northridge’s services are geared toward patients who want to recover and get back to a normal, healthy lifestyle. Physical Rehabilitation Each patient has access to physical, occupational and speech therapy services, and a fully equipped model apartment to help patients’ return to completing daily tasks such as showering, grooming, daily hygiene, dressing, cleaning, cooking, and laundry. Medical Services The Center at Northridge also offers skilled nursing care, family involvement, psychological care and discharge planning for many levels of patient needs, including medically complex scenarios, such as breathing tubes, feeding tubes, limited mobility or large wounds. The Center at Northridge has some of the highest staffing ratios in the industry. Amenities The Center at Northridge’s amenities include scenic views of mountains and the city, fully adjustable hospital beds and pressure relieving mattresses, flat-screen TVs in every room, free wireless internet, a security system with closed-circuit cameras, gourmet meals and fine dining, and limited transportation to appointments and dialysis. “The Center at Northridge is the perfect building,” said Patti Aldridge, NHA, Veritas’ director of operations. “We have taken all the lessons learned from our past projects and incorporated the best of everything into The Center at Northridge. It’s a beautiful facility with excellent design and construction quality. I'm very much on the operations side of skilled nursing facilities and I know what it takes to run a skilled nursing facility – this building has everything that we need to allow us to serve our clients.” Designed by H+L Architecture and built by construction manager/general contractor Pinkard Construction, The Center at Northridge is a three-story, steel-framed building on spread footings, with stem walls and three elevators – all on a 4.96-acre site. The second and third floors include 96 private patient suites with private bathrooms, 16 of which are observation rooms with oxygen and medical vacuum systems. The first floor includes a rehabilitation gym, full-service kitchen and fine-dining area, salon, large lobby and fireplace, and administrative/office space, plus activity areas on the second and third floors. Interior and Exterior Other building features include carpet tiles and ceramic floor tile, and quartz countertops in public spaces; patient rooms have luxury plank vinyl tile, solid-surface Corian counters, custom, built-in wardrobes/armoires and high-end light fixtures throughout. Nursing stations feature custom millwork and tile accent walls. Rehabilitation and kitchen equipment are owner supplied and contracted. The building exterior features a radiussed, 30-foot-high curtain wall and aluminum storefront windows, EIFS, and brick and stone veneer. Site work includes 10-foot over excavation with structural soil infill at footings, retaining walls and an asphalt parking lot. The gently sloping site offers unobstructed views of the Continental Divide. A considerable value engineering effort during preconstruction allowed the project to stay on budget. Additional value engineering during construction allowed Veritas to add scope without affecting the budget. Net change orders were less than 1 percent of the total contract value. Completed in 2016, final construction cost was $16.97 million.