Expanding Access to Care - The Mirebalais Hospital
In 2009, Partners In Health (PIH) and the Ministry of Health of Haiti requested that Dr. David Walton help design and build a new 100-bed community hospital in Mirebalais, Haiti, a small city 60 kilometers north of Port-au-Prince. For this large project, David solicited help from Jim Ansara who had retired after 30 years of running Shawmut Design & Construction, one of the largest design-build companies in the United States.
Building Back, Better
Jim and David had nearly completed the design of the 100-bed community hospital when, in January 2010, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti, destroying much of the country’s infrastructure. The Haitian Ministry of Health asked PIH to change their plans for Mirebalais Hospital and build a 300-bed university teaching hospital, much larger in size, scope, and complexity than originally planned. Construction began in July of 2010, and the 240,000-square-foot complex was inaugurated in October of 2012 as Hôpital Universitaire de Mirebalais, a new national teaching hospital and the largest solar-powered hospital in the Caribbean.
Hôpital Universitaire de Mirebalais
Jim and David realized the need for designing, building, and maintaining healthcare facilities extended far beyond Mirebalais – within Haiti and globally. BHI was formally founded in 2014, and over the past decade, has completed more than 200 projects in Haiti, Latin America, and Africa.