Industry Pulse (September 2006)

BOSTON – Tufts-New England Medical Center and New England Baptist Hospital, both based in downtown Boston, plan to build a suburban hospital with up to 190 beds and a $300 million price tag. Both hospitals are affiliated with the Tufts University School of Medicine. The hospitals have not yet named a specific location. The project is expected to take about five years and would be the first new acute-care hospital in Massachusetts in the past 25 years.

BURLINGAME, Calif. – Voters have approved construction of the long-proposed $488 million, 243-bed hospital by Mills-Peninsula Health Services in Burlingame, outside San Francisco. Mills-Peninsula is an affiliate of Sutter Health in Sacramento. The hospital is scheduled to open in 2010 and will replace the 380-bed Peninsula Medical Center in Burlingame. It will conform to the state’s seismic requirements, formally known at Senate Bill 1953. About 93 percent of voters approved the measure, which calls for a 50-year lease between the hospital system and the Peninsula Health District, which will collect $1.5 million each year in rent from Mills-Peninsula.

VIRGINIA – Virginia health regulators have agreed to allow MediCorp Health System of Fredericksburg, Va.,  to build a $158 million, 100-bed hospital in Stafford County – a growing region South of Washington, D.C. The state also approved a $152 million, 126-bed hospital in Spotsylvania County, which will be built by HCA Virginia Reston. The two counties are both in a growing region of northern Virginia, where the population has increased 25 percent in the past six years, according to the Virginia health department.

RICHMOND, Va. – Henrico Doctors’ Hospital in Richmond is planning a five-year, $80 million expansion of its Forest campus that would add 96 private patient rooms and more parking. The 340-bed hospital, part of Nashville, Tenn.-based HCA Inc. (NYSE: HCA), will not add new beds, but will privatize 96 patient rooms. The project also calls for expanding the emergency department and building a medical office building (MOB) on the campus. The hospital acquired land needed for the project from a nearby apartment complex. The Forest campus has 340 licensed beds – a number that will not increase. However, the ratio of private rooms to semiprivate rooms will increase with the opening of the new patient wing, which will be built over an underground parking deck. Hospital officials say the project is in response to patient demand for private rooms.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Methodist Hospital of Southern California in Arcadia is planning to add a 150,000 square foot patient tower and a new 348-space parking facility as part of an overall $115 million expansion and renovation. The new North Tower will house a new and upgraded emergency department, medical and surgical inpatient beds, and a new intensive care unit (ICU). Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. has been hired to provide construction management services.

ORLANDO, Fla. – Nemours Foundation of Jacksonville, Fla., is showing indications it will not give up easily on its quest to build a new $270 million children’s hospital in the Orlando area. The health system recently filed its second Certificate of Need (CON) application. A decision from the state is expected in December. Florida health officials rejected Nemours’ first request in June, saying the pediatric specialty group had not established the need for the 95-bed hospital. The proposal faced opposition from pediatric-service providers, chiefly Orlando Regional Healthcare, which operates Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children. Nemours and Orlando Regional had discussed a joint project, but talks fell apart. Nemours owns the 172-bed Alfred I. DuPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Del., as well as clinics in Florida and Delaware.

DES MOINES, Iowa – Mercy Medical Center-Des Moines filed a preliminary application with the city of West Des Moines to replace one of the hospital system’s two Des Moines campuses. The proposal would close Mercy Capitol, which is licensed for 226 beds, and move 75 beds to 100 beds to a new $80 million facility in the western suburb, according to initial cost estimates from system officials. West Des Moines and Mercy officials were expected to meet to discuss the final application. The final application must then be reviewed by city zoning officials and approved by the city council. Iowa’s CON law does not apply because construction would not move beds to another county. q