Mayo Clinic in Florida by the Numbers: 40 Years, 602 Acres, Nearly 12,000 Staff and 10,000 Transplants

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - Mayo Clinic in Florida turned 40 this month, and the numbers show how far the Jacksonville campus has come since it opened with a small staff on Oct. 13, 1986. It started with 35 physicians and 145 support staff and now employs nearly 12,000 people across 50 specialty areas, according to Mayo Clinic. The campus serves more than 184,000 patients a year from more than 80 countries.

Jacksonville was Mayo's first location outside its home in Rochester, Minn. Its Arizona campus followed in 1987, according to the Jacksonville Daily Record. "Throughout the last 40 years, the dedication, resilience and ingenuity of our teams have driven remarkable progress," Dr. Kent Thielen, CEO of Mayo Clinic in Florida, said in an anniversary news release.

How It Started

The campus exists largely because of one Jacksonville family. The Davis family, founders of the Winn-Dixie Stores supermarket chain, conveyed about 400 acres for the original campus, and business leader J.E. Davis led the effort to bring Mayo to the city, the Daily Record reported. The original Development of Regional Impact for the site was approved in 1988.

The early campus was modest by today's standards. It grew from a single five-story building into three main patient care buildings, a hospital, two research buildings and related clinical, administrative and support space. In 2011, its 25th year, the campus had more than 4,500 employees, according to the Daily Record.

The Campus and the Hospital

Mayo's main campus sits at 4500 San Pablo Road S. in Jacksonville. In October 2022, a Davis family entity conveyed another 210 acres along W.M. Davis Parkway, expanding Mayo's property from 392 acres to 602 acres. Mayo said the added land gives it room to grow for about 100 years, and its long-range plan allows up to 7.5 million square feet of development by 2045.

The hospital itself is newer than the clinic. Mayo Clinic Hospital opened on the campus in April 2008 with 214 beds, and two floors and 90 beds were added in 2012. In 2022, Mayo announced a $432 million project to add five floors to the tower, bringing it to 13 floors, with 121 new inpatient beds, including 56 intensive care beds.

The Transplant Program

Transplants are one of the campus's best-known services. The Mayo Clinic in Florida transplant program began in 1998, and in 2016 it completed its 3,000th liver transplant, becoming the seventh center in the nation to reach that mark, Action News Jax reported. The transplant team later moved into about 26,000 square feet on the fourth floor of the Davis Building in a $5.7 million project, according to the Daily Record.

The program has since passed a larger milestone. Mayo listed the Florida Transplant Center's 10,000th transplant among the campus's recent achievements in its 40th anniversary release. It also announced a research agreement with Carnegie Mellon University on new approaches to organ transplantation.

Rankings

The Jacksonville campus reached a new level in the national rankings this year. U.S. News & World Report's 2026-2027 Best Hospitals list named it the No. 1 hospital in Florida and placed it on the Honor Roll of the nation's top 20 hospitals for the first time. That put it alongside Mayo's campuses in Minnesota and Arizona, making Mayo the only organization with more than one hospital on the list, Action News Jax reported.

The campus was recognized nationally in eight specialties. It ranked No. 1 in Florida in six of them: cardiology, heart and vascular surgery; diabetes and endocrinology; gastroenterology and GI surgery; orthopedics; pulmonology and lung surgery; and urology. Newsweek also ranked it the No. 1 hospital in the Southeast.

Building Boom

Mayo has spent heavily on the campus in recent years. It has invested more than $1 billion in campus development over the past decade, and more than $800 million in major capital projects will add more than 725,000 square feet for patient care, research and technology, according to Mayo. Building permits cited by the Daily Record show a five-story, 250,000-square-foot tower addition valued at $130.7 million.

Several new buildings carry donors' names. The 228,000-square-foot Duan Family Building houses the first carbon-ion therapy system in the Americas, and the Lee Ringhaver Tower is named for a $75 million gift from Paula and Randy Ringhaver. The Mayo Clinic Berg Innovation Exchange is named for a $50 million gift from Gilchrist and Amy Berg, and the 252-room Hilton Jacksonville at Mayo Clinic gives patients and families a place to stay on campus.

Its Place in the Local Economy

Mayo's growth has made it a major part of the region's health care economy. In 2011, the Daily Record put Mayo's annual impact on the Jacksonville economy at $1.6 billion, when it had less than half its current workforce. A newer local estimate was not available, but staffing has grown from 8,314 in early 2022, as WJCT reported then, to nearly 12,000 today.

Local business leaders have long pointed to the clinic's name as an asset. "It's very much an important symbol for our city," Jerry Mallot, then an executive vice president of the JAX Chamber, told the Daily Record in 2011. The campus now draws patients from all 50 states and more than 80 countries, according to Mayo.

Where It Is

The main campus is at 4500 San Pablo Road S., Jacksonville, southeast of Mayo's newer North Campus land along W.M. Davis Parkway. The campus includes clinic buildings, the hospital, research buildings and the on-site Hilton. Patients can find appointment and visitor information at mayoclinic.org.