By HFT Staff

Providence announced investments totaling $177 million to address Portland's most urgent health care challenges by re-imagining emergency and critical cardiac care at Providence Portland and Providence St. Vincent Medical Centers, including Providence Heart Institute.  

Together, these improvements will provide room for an additional 50,000 emergency department visits each year – the equivalent of an entirely new emergency department for Portland – and support Providence Heart Institute as it cares for a growing number of patients with much more complex cardiac conditions than patients in the past. 

This commitment is the result of Tomorrow Starts Today, a capital campaign to enable faster, better care for more people. More than 80 percent of the total funding – $144 million – for today's announcement will come from generous donors, making it the largest campaign in Providence Oregon's history. 

With healthcare facilities nationwide struggling with overcrowding and dated infrastructure, Portland's providers face similarly pressing circumstances. Annually, patients make more than 200,000 emergency room visits to Providence's Portland area hospitals, including an increasing number of individuals with mental health needs. 

Tomorrow Starts Today will create more capacity and innovation across Portland through investments of $92 million in expanded and re-imagined emergency departments at Providence St. Vincent and Providence Portland and $85 million to expand critical cardiac care facilities, including a new cardiac intensive care unit, at Providence St. Vincent. 

Similar pressures are mounting for Providence Heart Institute, whose facilities were not built to handle patients who may spend weeks or even months in the cardiac intensive care unit (CICU). Tomorrow Starts Today will deliver transformative changes for Providence patients, including: 

• Reduced or eliminated wait times in the emergency department. 
• Critical innovations and new facilities so Providence Heart Institute can provide the very best in complex cardiac care to more people as a national center of excellence. 
• Improved safety, security and comfort for patients and caregivers. 
• More lives saved and better outcomes in areas of urgent need, including behavioral health, pediatrics and stroke care. 
• New flexible sites of care to accommodate more patients in moments of crisis such as a pandemic or natural disaster, and dedicated treatment rooms for people experiencing substance use crises and related behavioral health issues. 

The large and complex expansion and renovation projects began in 2023 and are expected to be completed by 2027. The announcement is the first time the entirety of Providence's capital improvement plans has been shared with the public. Projects are being strategically staggered in phases to maintain care capacity during construction. 

Andy and Nancy Bryant are co-chairing the effort to raise funds for the Providence St. Vincent emergency department, inspired by Andy and other family members' care in that facility. 

The Bryants are joined in their early support of this transformative campaign by other lead donors including Tim and Mary Boyle, the Lematta Family, Pat Reser and Bill Westphal, Mark and Mary Stevens, JTMF Foundation, The Chiles Foundation, The Zidell Family Foundation and others who have helped raise more than $125 million toward the campaign goal of $144 million in philanthropic funding.