A new home for the health sciences will soon rise in the heart of downtown Wichita.
A partnership between the University of Kansas and Wichita State University, the Wichita Biomedical Campus will house the Wichita campuses of KU School of Medicine and the School of Pharmacy, along with health professions students from Wichita State and WSU Tech.
"This partnership to create the Wichita Biomedical Campus represents an innovative way to effectively advance our mission to educate the leaders of tomorrow and help build healthy and vibrant communities."- KU Chancellor Douglas A. Girod, M.D.
The eight-story, 350,000 square foot tower will sit at the corner of Broadway and William and is expected to house 3,000 students and 200 faculty and staff. Pooling resources and creating a hub for health science education will create new opportunities for collaboration, innovation and research.
Wichita State and WSU Tech will share the first four stories of the new building. The fifth story will include adjoining anatomy labs and a shared Simulation Center with features including:
KU will use the top three stories for its classrooms, workspaces and offices, as well as enhanced recreational areas.
The standardized patient center on the 6th floor, which will be used exclusively for clinical skills training for KU students, includes 24 individual exam rooms with an adjacent 20-person pre- and post-event area and two 40-person classrooms for larger groups.
The top two floors of the building will include a student center and outdoor space, student group rooms and the new home of Farha Medical Library.
Two of every five active physicians in the U.S. will reach age 65 within the next 10 years, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. The country is facing a projected shortage of nearly 140,000 physicians by 2033.
The Wichita Biomedical Campus will expand the capacity for KU School of Medicine to train the next generation of physicians to serve the needs of urban and rural Kansans. The new building was designed with the intent to increase class sizes for medical students in Wichita — up to 70 students per year will be able to train at KU School of Medicine-Wichita. This growth will also create additional employment opportunities for faculty and staff.
“The Wichita Biomedical Campus will revolutionize health care education and put Wichita on the map as a hub for health care and innovative scientific research," Governor Laura Kelly said at the campus groundbreaking in May 2024. “The ripple effects of this campus include better health outcomes for everyday Kansans and, for the people in the region, access to superb health care in their own backyard.”
Architectural renderings provided here for illustration purposes only.
The Wichita Biomedical Campus represents a multi-university alliance, which will allow colleagues from four institutions to collaborate on research and teaching methods in a state-of-the-art facility.
The location of the Wichita Biomedical Center will provide options for students and faculty to live downtown, promoting easy access to dining, events and culture, and opportunities to be immersed in the Wichita urban experience.
We're excited to see the Wichita Biomedical Campus come to life. As our project moves forward, we'll continue to share updates. If you have a question in the meantime, please reach out via the form below.
