Saint Peter’s Health Partner’s Medical Associates provides a broad spectrum of professional health care services, and are currently developing a system of neighborhood primary care facilities. Brunswick Primary Care, located in Brunswick New York, is their flagship facility and is intended to serve as the model for subsequent sites located across the Capital Region. While focusing on traditional primary care these facilities will also offer a variety of specialty care services.
An intensive, collaborative and very interactive dialogue between the physicians, staff and design team provided the foundation for the work. The Brunswick facility supports three primary care physicians, with three dedicated exam rooms each and a shared nursing staff, configured to best fit modern practice protocols. While laboratory services are handled off-site, basic diagnostics including blood draw are provided here. This facility also provides bariatric care, including a suite of caregiver offices with specially designed exam rooms and support spaces. Outreach is an important aspect of the bariatric practice and this is supported by providing a large, audio-visual enhanced seminar room for public education.
The challenge of local health care facilities is integrating them into the neighborhood. The site of this facility revitalized a vacant retail space, centrally located in the community. The welcoming and attractive reception spaces are showcased through the traditional glass storefront; they are inviting rather than sterile. Once inside a straightforward but elegant combination of floor and wall finishes creates a natural wayfinding system that leads the patients through the examination suites. This project was also successful in terms of pragmatic necessities; providing a finely appointed facility within the allocated resources and the construction brought to completion ahead of schedule.
