Spending on hospital construction projects in Arkansas roughly doubled from 2014 to 2015, according to Arkansas Business.
As of November 2015, hospital construction projects had a valuation of $312 million, compared with $160 million in November of 2014. The $312 million figure doesn't include several major hospital expansion or renovation projects that have since begun. For instance, Arkansas Children's Hospital of Little Rock is in an early phase of building a hospital in Springdale, Ark., which is slated to open in January 2018. According to Arkansas Business, that project has a valuation of $167 million.
One of the biggest projects in 2015 was Baptist Health of Little Rock's construction of a new hospital 111-bed hospital in Conway, Ark., which is expected to open in September, according to the report.
Across the U.S., the value of hospital construction projects increased by 4 percent to almost $40 billion in 2015, the Associated Builders & Contractors of Washington, D.C., found, according to the report. The increase is largely due to the rise of private healthcare spending, which was up nearly 8.6 percent from 2014 to $31 billion. Public healthcare spending declined by 9.2 percent to $8.52 billion in 2015, according to the report.