Across the United States, health care systems are balancing financial pressure with growing outpatient demand. Construction costs for new facilities are 32% higher than in 20211. You may wonder if your system can afford to build, but when delivering excellence in patient care, can you afford not to build?
At Varco Pruden (VP), we provide owners and architects with steel construction solutions for health care facilities that meet this moment: modern, cost-predictable, and performance-driven facilities. Unlike typical steel building suppliers, VP integrates with you early to deliver cost modeling and load-optimized designs before ground breaks.
Why Steel Frames Matter for Health Care Facilities
Structural Spans
Steel-framed structures can achieve clear spans of up to 200 feet. Floor beams of 30-40’ allow for large service ducts and column-free zones. Long spans help provide open floor plans, an attractive feature in outpatient facilities and MOBs, where flexibility and future reconfiguration are important. Compared to wood, which has more limited structural spans and may require more columns, steel provides greater architectural freedom.
Sensitive Medical Equipment
A study at the University of Kentucky tested steel-framed floors in hospitals supporting sensitive equipment, validating that steel systems can meet required vibration serviceability limits per the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) Design Guide 11.2
Especially in imaging or surgical suites, the ability to engineer steel-framed floors to low vibration is critical. Wood-framed systems cannot typically meet those stringent dynamic requirements without heavy modifications.
Durability
Steel is non-combustible and generally retains its structural integrity better than many other materials under high heat conditions. These characteristics can help reduce the risk of fire spread, protect critical equipment, and provide additional time for evacuation when incorporated into a properly designed building system. Steel does not rot or decay. It resists warping and insects and is highly recyclable.
Why Varco Pruden
We specialize in design, steel fabrication, and construction of single and multi-story buildings, up to five stories, ideal for medical office buildings (MOB), outpatient centers, and specialty clinics. Whether your specialty is orthopedics, cardiology, gastroenterology, ophthalmology, or diagnostic imaging, we design to meet your needs.
Our health care mission is clear: Reduce Risk. Accelerate Revenue. Varco Pruden helps you reduce financial risk and accelerate your time-to-revenue without sacrificing flexibility or performance for your medical facility.
A Collaborative Design-Led Collaboration
We engage early in planning to align with your clinical, operational, and architectural priorities. With accurate design and cost modeling, our team helps you make informed capital decisions and avoid costly rework later.
System Flexibility for Any Project
From Pre-Engineered medical offices to Hybrid outpatient centers and Conventional multi-story medical office buildings, our range of steel envelope systems allows control of cost, performance, aesthetics, and schedule.
Engineering That Protects Critical Equipment
Our structures are designed to support the specialized loads and vibration control needed for MRI machines, CT scanners, and surgical suites, ensuring reliability, safety, and longevity.
Designed for Emerging Markets
Our Varco Pruden builder network is deeply established in Sun Belt and secondary growth markets, regions experiencing the highest outpatient expansion due to aging and migrating populations.
What This Means for You
- An experienced, trusted partner with expertise in health care facility design.
- Accelerated time-to-revenue through efficient design coordination and faster steel delivery.
- Cost predictability and fewer change orders, thanks to early-stage collaboration that minimizes redesign.
- Optimized lifecycle value with durable, industry-leading building products that reduce long-term maintenance costs.
- Budget confidence through transparent cost modeling from design through construction.
- Reduced construction risk with single-source steel envelope systems that eliminate coordination gaps. Plus, an experienced Varco Pruden Builder is coordinating onsite construction.
- Flexibility for future expansion with systems designed to adapt as patient care needs evolve.
Case in Point: St. Luke’s Health and Wellness Center
Completed with Varco Pruden Builder Canco General Contractors, this 15,200-square-foot medical office building in Lakeland, FL, is a hybrid facility housing four medical practices. This project highlights our ability to integrate structural integrity, energy efficiency, and modern design into a single patient care-focused facility.
Let’s Talk
Whether your next project is an ambulatory surgery center or a multi-tenant MOB, Varco Pruden will deliver the structural precision and collaboration that your health care facility demands.
Sources:
¹The State of Health Care Construction, Robins & Morton, 2024.