A four-year, $55 million renovation and expansion project at Riverside Walter Reed Hospital in Gloucester is now complete.

“What Riverside has created here, on the Middle Peninsula, is an advanced healing environment that is comfortable, not only for our patients, but also for their families and the entire community, too,” RWRH president Esther Desimini said.

Riverside CEO Bill Downey, once himself the administrator at Walter Reed, said the expansion and renovation project marked the most significant construction project at the community hospital since it opened in 1977.

The expansion includes a new two-story, 54,000-square-foot main lobby, surgical and inpatient services building.

The Surgical Services Suite in the new building includes three operating suites, two procedure rooms, and pre-operative and post-operative recovery areas. Advanced LED lighting that puts off less heat and is camera-equipped, enables surgical video integration that provides a complete picture of the patie...