FSU opened a 137,000-square-foot research and training building on the Tallahassee Memorial campus Friday. A family medicine practice for 12,000 patients a year is on the first floor.

Florida State University opened its new FSU Health Research and Collaboration Building on Friday. The 137,000-square-foot building sits on the FSU Health Tallahassee Memorial Hospital campus.

It brings medical research, a family medicine practice and health care training under one roof, the university said in its announcement.

The FSU Board of Trustees voted Friday morning to name it the Wilton Simpson FSU Health Research and Collaboration Building. Simpson, now Florida’s commissioner of agriculture, was Senate president in 2022. FSU said he helped secure $125 million in construction funding that year, plus $20 million a year in recurring funding for the university’s health work.

What is inside

FSU described the building floor by floor:

  • First floor: the FSU Family Medicine Residency practice, which serves more than 12,000 patients a year, plus space for community education and training
  • Second floor: simulation rooms set up as operating rooms, hospital rooms and a fully equipped one-bedroom apartment, where students and residents train with actors playing patients and with virtual reality
  • Third and fourth floors: research labs for tissue culture, biobanking and gene editing, with exam and procedure rooms

The university put the building’s cost at $137.5 million.

Jobs and research money

FSU said the building will hold more than 150 researchers. The university expects it to:

  • attract $40 million a year in research grants
  • support more than 350 permanent jobs
  • generate more than $217 million a year in economic impact

Those are the university’s projections.

“This building represents a huge strengthening of that fabric, and it really helps us to complete the fabric of healthcare in our region,” said Mark O’Bryant, president and CEO of Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare.

More than 250 people attended the ceremony, FSU said. University President Richard McCullough thanked the Leon County Board of County Commissioners and the Tallahassee City Commission, among others, for supporting the project.

Part of a bigger FSU and TMH deal

The opening follows agreements FSU and Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare finalized in late September. They set a long-term framework for FSU Health covering patient care, medical education and research, the university said.

The deal also covers a future FSU Health hospital in Panama City Beach, about 100 miles west. FSU expects it to open in 2028.

What it means for you

The FSU Family Medicine Residency practice is on the building’s first floor, on the Tallahassee Memorial campus. FSU did not say whether the practice is taking new patients, so call the practice before you go.

The building also gives FSU’s medical and nursing students and residents a place to train in Tallahassee before they work in local hospitals and clinics.

For more FSU news, read how the MagLab won $18 million for a new magnet facility.