A number of U.S. hospitals have closed recently due to financial stress. That’s partly why architecture firm GBBN implemented several design features to help a rural Indiana healthcare system save money on its new hospital.
Margaret Mary Health expects to open a 125,000-square-foot hospital in Batesville in early June, according to a statement. The healthcare provider hired Colliers to “identify potential buyers and developers” for its existing hospital on Mitchell Avenue, which it plans to vacate upon completion of the new facility.
Margaret Mary Health, a not-for-profit health network with 10 locations in southeastern Indiana, hired GBBN Architects, a healthcare specialist, for its new facility.
Once it opens, the building is expected to be Indiana's first all-electric hospital and one of the nation's most energy-efficient hospitals, resulting in about $9 million in yearly cost savings over the next 25 years, according to GBBN.
A big part of that energy efficiency is because the hospital is powered by a geothermal heat pump that helps reduce energy use and costs, GBBN said. These pumps take advantage of the constant temperature of the shallow earth by exchanging cold air with warm air and vice versa, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. The hospital's efficiency helped Margaret Mary Health qualify for clean energy tax incentives.
Cuts to federal and state funding, the rising costs of medical care and infrastructure and rising patient volumes led to about two-dozen hospital closings in 2025, according to Becker’s Hospital Review, a trade publication.
The hospital shutdowns have occurred in both rural and urban areas. Rural hospitals that closed last year include facilities in Wichita Falls, Texas, and Cape Girardeau, Missouri. In large urban areas, hospitals closed in Chicago, St. Louis and Washington, D.C. In one of the largest closings, Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital in New York shut its doors in April.
The financial bottom line wasn’t the only factor guiding the design of Margaret Mary Health's $115 million hospital in Batesville. Visual features such as a “stone wall at registration … the glass artwork on patient headwalls [and] neutral paint tones and large windows [to] bring in natural light” will help make patients feel comfortable, according to Margaret Mary Health.
The new hospital is located on the Six Pine Ranch campus on Indiana Highway 229 near Interstate 74, about halfway between Cincinnati and Indianapolis. Margaret Mary Health said the new hospital will join a nearby cancer care center and a medical office building to create a wellness campus.
GBBN, based in Cincinnati, has designed dozens of hospitals across the country. Its portfolio includes Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Shadyside hospital and the Novak Center for Children’s Health in Louisville, Kentucky.
For the record
Danis and Bruns-Gutzwiller are construction managers. Megan Martin and Katie Sobotowski at Colliers represent Margaret Mary Health on the sale of the existing hospital.