On Tuesday afternoon, May 23, Sinai Hospital officially broke ground on a three-story, 125,000-square-foot facility that will bring together all outpatient cancer services at the Northwest Baltimore medical center. More than 100 people attended the ceremony.
Located on the east side of Sinai’s campus facing Greenspring Avenue, the state-of-the-art Mandy and Dennis Weinman Cancer Building — named in honor of the local philanthropists who donated $5 million to help fund the facility — will be home to the Alvin & Lois Lapidus Cancer Institute and the Pediatric Oncology Center.
The facility will have 32 adult infusion bays, 16 adult exam spaces, seven pediatric infusion bays, six pediatric exam rooms, renovated radiation oncology suites and other support services and spaces. The project was designed with input from both patients and families, including adult and pediatric advisory groups. Multi-disciplinary teams of health care providers and other staff also invested hundreds of hours to ensure that the building will meet the needs of caregivers, patients and their families.
The building’s design features a surplus of natural light, treatment and exam rooms, and spaces for patients and visitors, including a living room, areas for visitors to work while they are waiting, an art therapy space, a playroom and more. The adult infusion area on the third floor will offer patients a view of the nearby 200-acre Cylburn Arboretum.
Caregivers from both the adult and pediatric oncology care teams at Sinai were on hand to celebrate the groundbreaking. Construction of the Weinman Building is expected to require about two-and-a-half years.
The Weinman Building marks an investment in cancer services at Sinai, including the recruitment of additional sub-specialty oncologists and an expanded focus on research. With much of cancer treatment now provided in the outpatient setting, the Weinman Building will have its own entrance and parking so patients will feel separated from the hospital while receiving care.
Among the speakers at the groundbreaking ceremony were Leslie Simmons, interim president of Sinai and Grace Medical Center and executive vice president and chief operating officer of LifeBridge Health; Dr. Matthew Poffenroth, chief physician executive and senior vice president of LifeBridge Health and president of LifeBridge Health Medical Group; and Dr. Pallavi Kumar, division director of medical oncology at the Alvin & Lois Lapidus Cancer Institute.
Also speaking at the ceremony was Donald Tynes Jr., son of community activist Donald Tynes Sr., who died in March of 2022. The Weinman Building’s family living room and work area will be named in honor of Donald Tynes Sr., thanks to a gift from the SECU MD Foundation. (Tynes was a longtime board member of SECU, Maryland’s largest state-chartered credit union.)
Founded in East Baltimore in 1866 as the Hebrew Hospital and Asylum, Sinai — with 483 beds — is the largest community hospital in Maryland, according to its website. As a Jewish-sponsored, nonprofit teaching hospital, Sinai provides training for more than 140 residents and 400 medical students annually. Since 1998, Sinai Hospital has been a part of the LifeBridge Health system.
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