What are they building?

You may have noticed some building activity at Pioneer Health of the past few months, and wondered what all the commotion was about. We are proud to announce that we are in the process of completing a building that will house an on-site pharmacy. This should make your visit to the practice even more convenient for you, by providing you the convenience of “one-stop” access to your doctor, pathology blood test collection and medications as required. The friendly team from North Road Pharmacy will be moving across to the Pioneer Road campus, and we are planning to have the new pharmacy opened in the first quarter of 2008.

Part of this stage of construction also included an additional two consulting rooms for our practice, to accommodate the growing number of GPs at Pioneer Health Albany. As you may know, we were pleased to welcome Dr Brad Atkinson and Dr Stephen Lee to the practice earlier this year. (Along with our complement of two GP registrars, this brings our current complement of doctors to 9.) This increase of doctor availability should ensure that you will be able to see a doctor at Pioneer Health when you need to.

We have numerous comments on the distinctive shape of the new pharmacy building. As you will see there are lots of angles on the building, giving parts of the structure a curved appearance. This is because the building that you see, is designed to be part of a bigger structure that features circular buildings joined by curved waists. The pharmacy building is in fact one of these waists, that is designed to fit onto a future larger circular building. This design is a departure from the traditional architecture seen in health construction, that we believe is not only aesthetically pleasing, but more importantly will provide a more efficient building. At this stage I would like to make special mention of two people that have been instrumental in the Pioneer construction projects to date: our architect Angelo Strano and our builder Russell Schlager. I am proud to count both of these gentlemen amongst my friends, and without Angelo’s expert advice and encouragement and Russ’ dedication and excellence in building, Pioneer Health would have not come into existence.

The Pioneer Health campus that you see taking shape, has been the result of many years of planning, designing, redesigning and overcoming numerous bureaucratic obstacles. The goal has always been to provide well designed, purpose built structures for our team, patients and community to enjoy. If we succeed in serving your health needs at Pioneer Health, our building endeavours will have been well worthwhile.