Mount Sinai South Nassau Breaks Ground on Four-Story Expansion to Better Serve the South Shore

New building will double size of the Emergency Department, add 40-bed critical care unit and nine, modern surgical suites

Mount Sinai South Nassau today broke ground on a $130 million, four-story addition that will double the size of its Emergency Department, add 40 critical care beds, and nine new operating suites to better serve the South Shore of Long Island.

Mount Sinai leaders joined with local elected officials and civic leaders to mark the start of construction of the 100,000-square-foot J Wing, one of the largest building projects in Nassau County and the cornerstone of the hospital’s ongoing $400 million capital expansion project. The new building, expected to be completed in 2023, will help position the hospital to improve and expand services in the community for decades to come. Whiting Turner of White Plains, NY, is the general contractor while Manhattan-based HOK is the architect of the project.

“Mount Sinai is proud to serve the Long Island community as a health care leader,” said Kenneth L. Davis, MD, President and CEO of Mount Sinai Health System. “Every day, our world-class experts are finding new answers to the most challenging health problems, creating greater access to advance medicine and scientific breakthroughs, growing programs locally, and making important investments like this one, that better serve this community and improves overall health and outcomes for patients.”

"The extraordinary investment being made on the MSSN campus is emblematic of the Mount Sinai Health System’s deep and long-term commitment to providing world class clinical services to all the residents of Long Island," said Arthur Klein, MD, President, Mount Sinai Health Network.

“This is a proud and historic day in Mount Sinai South Nassau’s 93-year history,” said Richard J. Murphy, President and CEO. “This hospital has a legacy of serving our community and providing our patients with extraordinary health care. This once-in-a-generation project will allow us to meet the future needs of the communities we serve along the South Shore of Nassau County for years to come.”

The hospital’s Board of Directors, which has been instrumental in planning the expansion, joined the groundbreaking ceremony and praised the ability of the hospital leadership to move the project forward, even during the pandemic. The project is creating hundreds of construction jobs and will further strengthen Mount Sinai South Nassau as one of the region’s largest employers and providers of quality health care.

“Our goal has been to bring additional high-level services to the Oceanside campus so our patients and their families do not have to travel as often to the city for needed care,” said Joseph J. Fennessy, who serves as Co-Chair of the hospital’s Board, a voluntary position. Mr. Fennessy is also one of the hospital’s most generous benefactors.



Adhi Sharma, MD, Chief Medical Officer and Executive Vice President, said patients who arrive at the hospital are generally older with advanced diseases requiring more critical care beds. The new addition’s surgical suites also are more spacious to allow for sophisticated diagnostic equipment to be located directly in the operating rooms. The new operating suites also could pave the way for an open-heart program at the Oceanside campus, pending Department of Health approval.

“This addition will allow our clinical staff to do what they do best – provide high quality care in a modern setting that will benefit thousands of patients and families for generations to come,” Dr. Sharma said.

The $158 million of Federal Emergency Management Agency money that Mount Sinai South Nassau received in 2015 to restore health care in Long Beach and expand services for Nassau’s South Shore will be used in part to construct the J Wing. In November 2020, the hospital broke ground on a $35-million, 15,400-square-foot medical arts pavilion in Long Beach near the site of the former Long Beach Medical Center.

Anthony Cancellieri, Chair of the Building Committee throughout the process and Co-Chair of the Board, said Mount Sinai South Nassau has used the federal FEMA funds wisely and in a manner that will strengthen the hospital’s infrastructure, if another Superstorm Sandy-type event were to strike.

“With this new patient wing, an expanded Emergency Department and a new Central Utility Plant, the hospital will be able to better serve the more than 900,000 residents of the South Shore who depend on us for critical services,” Mr. Cancellieri said.

Under a provision of federal law championed by U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, known as the “alternative use” provision, Mount Sinai South Nassau was permitted to use some of the FEMA funds it received from Superstorm Sandy at its Oceanside campus. Long Beach residents, who represent one of the highest percentages of Mount Sinai South Nassau patients, have traditionally traveled to the Oceanside campus to access more sophisticated services.

Currently, the hospital’s Emergency Department treats about 65,000 patients annually, but is designed to handle only 35,000. Upon completion of the J Wing, the Emergency Department’s square footage will nearly double to the size of a football field and will include separate treatment areas for geriatric and behavioral health patients. The design of the expanded Emergency Department will also feature separate entrances for walk-in patients and patients transported by ambulance, as well a larger ambulance docking bay to facilitate the triage of patients from ambulances.

The J Wing’s expanded ICU will allow Mount Sinai South Nassau to meet the region’s rising need for critical care services as demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic. While the demand for medical-surgical beds is decreasing, the number of patients in need of highly specialized care provided in ICUs is on the rise. The hospital projects that need for ICU beds will double.



The J Wing addition is one of four major construction projects underway or in the planning stages at Mount Sinai South Nassau. The 15,400-square-foot, single-story Long Beach Medical Arts Pavilion, projected to open in the fall of 2022, will bring specialty medical care back to the barrier island, including Primary Care, Geriatrics, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Gastroenterology and GI Procedures, Orthopedics, Urology, Cardiology, Diagnostic Lab, and Imaging Services.

 A new $103 million power plant at the Oceanside campus will upgrade the hospital’s electrical, heating, ventilation, and cooling systems and fortify the hospital’s infrastructure against potential future storms. The plant also will help provide power for the J Wing.

The capital expansion project also calls for the future construction of a new $28 million parking structure. To be developed in the lots east of One Healthy Way (parking lots 1 & 2), the structure will result in a net increase of over 400 parking spaces, dramatically improving and alleviating existing parking conditions on campus and in the surrounding neighborhood. (No FEMA funds are being spent on the parking structure.)

FEMA funds cover $158 million for the J Wing, Central Utility Plant, Emergency Electrical Infrastructure, and Long Beach Medical Arts Pavilion (including $4 million from the federal government’s Department of Housing and Urban Development). The total cost of these four projects is estimated to cost $372 million. Hospital resources, including money raised from benefactors and from the community during the Emergency Department Capital Campaign, will help fund the additional cost of the building projects.

For more information about the J Wing or Mount Sinai South Nassau’s ongoing expansion projects, go to www.southnassau.org/sn/fema-projects.

About Mount Sinai South Nassau
The Long Island flagship hospital of the Mount Sinai Health System, Mount Sinai South Nassau is designated a Magnet® hospital by the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) for outstanding nursing care. Mount Sinai South Nassau is one of the region’s largest hospitals, with 455 beds, more than 900 physicians and 3,500 employees. Located in Oceanside, NY, the hospital is an acute-care, not-for-profit teaching hospital that provides state-of-the-art care in cardiac, oncologic, orthopedic, bariatric, pain management, mental health and emergency services and operates the only Trauma Center on the South Shore of Nassau County, along with Long Island’s only free-standing Emergency Department in Long Beach.

In addition to its extensive outpatient specialty centers, Mount Sinai South Nassau provides emergency and elective angioplasty, and offers Novalis Tx™ and Gamma Knife® radiosurgery technologies. Mount Sinai South Nassau operates the only Trauma Center on the South Shore of Nassau County verified by the American College of Surgeons as well as Long Island’s only free-standing, 9-1-1 receiving Emergency Department in Long Beach. Mount Sinai South Nassau also is a designated Stroke Center by the New York State Department of Health and Comprehensive Community Cancer Center by the American College of Surgeons; is an accredited center of the Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery Association and Quality Improvement Program; and an Infectious Diseases Society of America Antimicrobial Stewardship Center of Excellence.
For more information, go to www.mountsinai.org/southnassau.