The Children’s Hospital of Saskatchewan is one step closer to reality as the province announced an increase in funding of $15.5 million, Thursday morning at the Children’s Hospital Warehouse.

The funding comes on top of $200 million the province gave to the Saskatoon Health Region in 2009 and Jackie Mann, vice president of integrated health services at SHR explained the increase shows the provinces commitment to the project.

“This really allows us to continue on in the direction that we’re going with the schematic design that we’ve developed over the past year,” said Mann. “It’s an incredibly important step.”

Saskatchewan’s Health Minister, Dustin Duncan said floor plan designs for the new hospital contained feedback from consultations with patients and their families–something he says is crucial to providing good service.

Duncan said the patient and family experience could be what’s lacking from Saskatchewan’s current healthcare system.

“For far too long in healthcare, maybe that was part of it that was missing,” said Duncan. “We thought too much about the system itself and not so much about the patient.”

He said the Patient First Review in 2009 “renewed our focus on what we’re doing this for and that is the patient.”

Completion is expected in late 2016 and the new hospital will be located near the Royal University Hospital.