IU Health’s First Fort Wayne Hospital
Indiana University Health is investing $421 million to build its first hospital in the City of Fort Wayne — a 295,000 square foot, five-story, 140-bed facility on a 300-acre campus near the intersection of I-69 and Airport Expressway. A connected three-story, 50,000 SF medical office building will house primary care, specialty care, infusion therapy, advanced imaging, cardiology, orthopedics, and general surgery.
IU Health entered the Fort Wayne market in 2018 and has since opened eight locations serving over 30,000 patients. This hospital represents the next step — a full-service regional healthcare anchor that will create 500 new jobs and bring 60 additional healthcare providers to northeast Indiana.
Clinical Scope
The new hospital brings a full range of acute and specialty care to the Fort Wayne market:
- 6 operating rooms
- 17 emergency department exam rooms
- 3 catheterization labs
- 4 endoscopy rooms
- 140 inpatient beds across specialized units
The 300-acre site in southwest Allen County was selected for both its accessibility — positioned at a major interstate junction — and its capacity for future growth, with plans for additional medical offices, green space, and trail networks surrounding the hospital campus.
Building the Structure
The hospital is a steel-framed structure — 2,000 tons of structural steel, over 10,000 cubic yards of concrete, and 200+ tons of reinforcing rebar. The entire structural frame was erected in less than one year. Pepper Construction employed off-site prefabrication for mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems to accelerate the schedule.
The building envelope — MVGeneral’s scope — includes limestone, brick, curtain wall glazing systems, metal panel, and TPO roofing. These aren’t just aesthetic choices. On a hospital designed around a 300-well geothermal heating and cooling system (the first in the IU Health system, with wells extending 500 feet deep), the exterior envelope works in concert with the mechanical systems to maintain the precise environmental controls that clinical spaces demand.
Construction Timeline
| Milestone | Date |
|---|---|
| Groundbreaking | September 2024 |
| Topping Off | July 2025 |
| Projected Opening | May 1, 2027 |
Our Role
MVGeneral embedded a project engineer on the Pepper Construction team for the exteriors portion of the hospital build. Pepper Construction serves as construction manager on the project, bringing extensive healthcare construction experience across Indiana.
Our PE’s responsibilities on the exteriors scope included:
- Submittal and RFI processing — Managing documentation flow for exterior systems, materials, and assemblies between the field, the owner, and the design team
- Field verification — Verifying field measurements and maintaining accurate as-built documentation for the building envelope
- Subcontractor coordination — Communicating with and directing exterior trade subcontractors to maintain schedule and quality
- Owner and architect communication — Providing clear, consistent updates on project status, budget, and schedule
- Quality reporting — Processing quality reports to ensure exterior work met the standards required for a healthcare facility
On a hospital, the building envelope is where the controlled interior environment begins. Every detail in the exteriors scope — weather barrier, air barrier, thermal performance, moisture management — directly impacts the clinical environment inside. Getting it right means getting it documented, verified, and coordinated at the PE level.
MVGeneral’s project engineer completed the exteriors scope, and the project has since transitioned to the interiors phase under Pepper Construction’s continued management.
Project Team
- Indiana University Health — Owner
- Pepper Construction — Construction Manager
- Gresham Smith — Architect
- Garmong Construction — Building Construction
- MVGeneral Construction Services — Project Engineering (Exteriors)
Status
The hospital celebrated its topping off on July 16, 2025 — the final steel beam placed on a $421 million structure that went vertical in under a year. Building completion is targeted for late October 2026, with the first patients expected in May 2027. When it opens, it will be IU Health’s first hospital in Fort Wayne and home to Indiana’s first geothermal-powered healthcare facility.
Need project engineering support for healthcare or large-scale institutional construction? Start a conversation about how MVGeneral delivers reliable execution on the scopes that matter most.