First Look: West Penn Hospital’s new $50M imaging center

PITTSBURGH — When Allegheny Health Network and Highmark Health decided on a $50 million renovation of West Penn Hospital’s imaging department, it didn’t just include new equipment and more comfortable furniture.

West Penn has been a fixture in the Bloomfield section of Pittsburgh since the 1840s, and the current footprint was opened in the early 1900s and then added to many times along the way. West Penn’s imaging department wasn’t completely in one section of the hospital. The two MRI devices, for instance, were located in the basement, far from the rest of the imaging department.

“We wanted to redesign it,” said Dr. Jeff Mueller, chair of the AHN Department of Radiology and Imaging Services, of the West Penn Hospital’s imaging department that now totals 46,382 square feet.