The Ontario government is spending nearly $800 million on a new 15-storey patient care tower at Toronto Western Hospital.

The investment will bring more beds and operating rooms to University Health Network’s campus on Bathurst Street in downtown Toronto, which currently serves about 450,000 people.

The plan entails more comfortable space for family members, modern digital infrastructure, and 82 patient and critical care beds with single-patient rooms to enhance infection control.

Twenty new operating rooms will also make space for complex neurosurgical and spinal procedures. It’s expected that The number of surgeries are expected to increase by more than 20 per cent over the next decade. Total completion is expected by 2028.

Dr. Kevin Smith, President and CEO of UHN, said the hospital is increasingly serving patients across the province, not just Toronto.

“Our surgical teams perform some of the most advanced surgical procedures to treat the most complex patients,” he said. “We’re incredibly grateful to the Government of Ontario for this remarkable investment which will help UHN enhance our pioneering work particularly in caring for complex neurological and orthopedic cases from across the province.”