Rush University Medical Center: $450 million cancer, neuroscience facility opening Feb. 7 on Chicago’s West Side

Susan Newton often felt like “Count Dracula” when she saw other patients in full view when she got a blood transfusion.

What Newton could really take advantage of was a little more privacy, she said Friday.

Newton, 30, is not without gratitude for the treatment he received at Rush University Medical Center, but said he is happy with the hospital’s new treatment. Her $450 million, 500,000-square-foot outpatient facility is set to open on February 7th. Newton was part of the Patient Advisory Group for this project.

“The big difference is having a private space,” Newton said of the tour on Friday.

Patients were sometimes separated by curtains, but not always, she said. New infusion rooms have doors and sofas for visitors, often with views of the downtown skyline.

The Joan and Paul Rubschlager Building is billed as a high-tech, one-stop outpatient treatment center for cancer, neurological and gastrointestinal diseases.

Dr. Omar Latif, president and CEO of Lush, says that newly diagnosed cancer patients often have several different areas to work in when dealing with their cancer diagnosis. You will be given a shopping list of things.

“This is the fragmentation that defines healthcare around the world. That fragmentation dies here,” said Lateef.

Rush Chief Medical Officer Paul Casey, Ph.D.

The new facility is expected to allow Rush to expand its cancer treatment capacity by about 50 percent, according to management.

The building is named after the Lubschlager family of donors who ran the Lubschlager Baking Corporation on the West Side until it was sold in 2014.

Joan Lubuschlager says, “I know that when you give what you can, you feel better and you get what you give back.