Shareholders of the P450-million Bohol Doctors’ Hospital on Monday morning broke ground for their five-story health facility located in the resort town of Panglao, marking the start of their bid to establish a medical tourism industry in the province.
The Bohol Doctors’ Hospital, designed to be “hospitel” or hospital-hotel, will be a 100-bed facility with 50 allocated for in-patients, 30 for assisted-living patients and 20 beds for hotel rooms, said CEO and president Board Member Jade Bautista.
The private hospital, which will have an 8,000 square-foot total floor area, will be replete with “state-of-the-art” facilities including a system that will allow doctors abroad to check on their patients’ status at the Bohol hospital, a medical arts building and a dialysis center, among others, Bautista added.
“It has been a major concern of Boholanos that our health services sector is wanting. So this project is aimed to [address] just that and to complement tourism by contributing in health services particularly through medical tourism, so that Boholanos and tourists alike may no longer have to go to Cebu for their healthcare needs,” she said.
The hospital, located at a 5,000 square-foot lot near the New Bohol Panglao International Airport, the country’s first “green” airport, will be Bohol’s first eco-friendly healthcare facility.
Bautista said that the hospital will mostly run on solar power and will be designed with “green” architecture.
“Hopefully this project will add texture to the Bohol wonder that is continuously unfolding while also being able to provide livelihood to some of our kababayans,” she added.
Bautista’s group has tapped YCON Construction, Inc. as contractor for the project which is expected to be completed in 12 to 18 months.
“With the very good contractor that we have, they have promised that they will be able to finish it in 12 months or a year and a half,” she said.
The Bohol Doctors’ Hospital has started to process permits ahead of the start of its operations as Bautista noted that they are “80 percent” done with securing necessary documents to operate. (RT)