Lincoln – Madonna Rehabilitation Hospitals expects to begin a $57 million expansion on its Lincoln campus this spring.

The project is a planned three-story, 112,000-square-foot patient wing that will also add 59 new rooms to replace ones that were built in the early 1970s, the Lincoln Journal Star reported. Madonna currently has 120 patient rooms, and about half were upgraded and modernized in 2000.

The wing will be added to the southwest of the existing 460,000-square-foot hospital in east Lincoln. The new rooms will be bigger and more modern than current ones, allowing patients to be more independent and providing more room for staff and families, hospital officials said at a news conference last Wednesday.

“Our goal is to try to move patients to as much independence as possible,” said Dan Griess, vice president of facilities and ancillary services.

Construction will happen in phases and is expected to be completed by January 2023, Griess said. The new wing will be built first. Once it’s finished, Madonna will remodel existing patient rooms. That project will provide storage, support space for staff and a new therapy gym, among other things, he said. The project also includes a new main entrance for the campus.

Madonna does not plan to expand its staff, since the number of overall patient rooms will not increase, Madonna President and CEO Paul Dongilli Jr. said.

The company has about 1,600 employees in Lincoln. It opened an Omaha campus in 2016, where it employs more than 500 people.