Hospital News Roundup for June 8
Adventist Health CFO Doug Rebok said the not-for-profit hospital system reported an increase in earnings despite a revenue decline related to the sale of Paradise Valley Hospital in National City, the Sacramento Business Journal reports.
Rebok said the hospital generated $150 million annually but operated at a loss.
Adventist reported earnings of $35.5 million and net revenue of $1.68 billion for 2006, compared with earnings of $34.4 million and net revenue of $1.74 billion in 2005 (Robertson, Sacramento Business Journal, 6/1).
Corona Regional Medical Center on Monday opened a new $4 million intensive care unit, the Riverside Press-Enterprise reports.
Susan Reed, ICU director, said the new unit increases the amount of patient beds from 10 to 22. She added that once current patients are transported to the new ICU, the old unit will be renovated.
Hospital CEO Ken Rivers said the new ICU, along with a new emergency department that opened last week, is the start of a renovation plan that will help transform the 228-bed hospital into a regional care provider (Johnson, Riverside Press-Enterprise, 6/4).
Fresno Heart Hospital has been renamed Fresno Heart & Surgical Hospital to reflect additional procedures now offered at the facility, the Fresno Bee reports. The hospital now provides bariatric, general and minimally invasive joint replacement surgical services.
Community Medical Centers, the hospital's owner, added the services in an effort to boost the hospital's financial performance (Fresno Bee, 6/2).
Lynn Frank, director of Sacramento County health and human services, said she will postpone until Aug. 7 her final recommendations on whether Kaiser Permanente should receive a trauma center designation, the Sacramento Bee reports. Kaiser is competing with Methodist Hospital to receive the designation from the county.
Frank in April endorsed Kaiser's bid for the designation. Methodist last month filed a formal protest against the endorsement, saying a flawed analysis led to the recommendation.
County supervisors also postponed their vote on the issue from July to Nov. 6 (Kalb, Sacramento Bee, 6/5).
The Palo Alto Medical Foundation this week planned to begin demolition of buildings on the site of its proposed medical center and hospital, the San Francisco Examiner reports.
PAMF plans to build a medical center and 91-bed hospital on the 18-acre site.
Alan Leavitt, spokesperson for Northgate Environmental Management, said demolition of the buildings should take two to three months, followed by site cleanup which could take a year or longer.
PAMF's proposal will undergo several public meetings before votes by the San Carlos Planning Commission and City Council (Winegarner, San Francisco Examiner, 6/5).
State and local officials gathered on Monday to dedicate the new Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Westwood, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The 520-bed hospital originally was scheduled to open in 2004, but cost overruns and construction delays pushed the date back. Officials said the hospital should open between March 2008 and June 2008.
James Atkinson, senior medical director of clinical operations for the hospital, said the total cost for the new facility will reach about $1 billion (Groves, Los Angeles Times, 6/5).
Sequoia Hospital in Redwood City is preparing to seek more funding for its proposed seismic retrofit and expansion project, according to Stephani Scott, CEO of Sequoia Healthcare District, the San Francisco Business Times reports.
Scott said the district already has committed $25 million toward the project, which is slated to cost at least $240 million.
The hospital in fall 2008 plans to begin construction of a new pavilion that will house an advanced cardiovascular center and medical-surgical services. Construction of a new medical office building will begin late next year, while the seismic retrofit of the existing facility should be complete by 2009 (Rauber, San Francisco Business Times, 6/1).