The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center has begun moving 425 patients into its new University Hospital, a 26-story, 1.9 million-square-foot facility that adds nearly 400 beds to the Columbus-based health system.

The hospital, located at 520 West 10th Avenue, includes 820 private rooms, and will support services such as surgery, neurology, neurosurgery, critical care and adult organ transplantation. The project has been in development for roughly a decade and is the largest single-facility construction effort in the university’s history. According to the medical center, it is also the largest single-facility hospital project opening in the United States in 2026.

Ohio State President Walter “Ted” Carter Jr. said the opening reflects years of planning and investment. “Thousands of people have been working diligently for years to turn our vision for a transformational hospital that improves lives across Ohio, the nation and the world into a reality,” he said. “Today is about so much more than opening a building. It’s about honoring our land-grant mission by delivering life-changing patient care, advancing innovative research and providing high-quality education for generations to come.”
The facility houses 24 operating rooms, including two hybrid neurovascular suites designed for complex stroke care, 10 interventional radiology suites and 234 intensive care unit beds. It also includes 148 additional beds dedicated to patients of the Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute. The hospital is designated as the region’s only Level 4 maternity care center and includes an express elevator for laboring patients.

John J. Warner, M.D., CEO of the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, said the building’s layout is intended to support team-based care. “Medicine today and in the future is about teamwork and collaboration, and our hospital design reinforces our efforts to coalesce as a team around patients and their loved ones,” he said.

The expansion comes as central Ohio’s population is projected to surpass 3 million by 2050, according to the Mid-Ohio Regional Planning Commission.

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