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Buildings
Healthcare Network Planned for New Orleans
(louisiana.construction.com, February 2006 issue)
By Martin
Schwartz
Tenet Healthcare Corp. said recently
that it plans to invest several hundred million dollars in
a new health network anchored in New Orleans.
Tenet said that prior to the hurricanes
it was the largest provider of hospital services in the New
Orleans area with more than 1,000 patient beds, 5,500 employees,
2,000 affiliated physicians and an annual payroll of more
than $221 million.
"Research shows that, over time,
at least a majority of New Orleans' population is expected
to return, augmented by many more who will be drawn to the
incredible reconstruction effort that has only just begun,"
said Trevor Fetter, Tenet's president and CEO. "Tenet
will rebuild and restore where we can. We will construct new
facilities where we need to, and we will give New Orleans
a locally focused network that will be essential to meet the
community's health care in the years ahead."
Hurricane Katrina severely damaged two
of Tenet's central hospital campuses in New Orleans - the
317-bed Memorial Medical Center and 187-bed Lindy Boggs Medical
Center - which remain closed indefinitely.
Three other hospitals serving the region
- the 174-bed NorthShore Regional Medical Center in Slidell,
203-bed Kenner Regional Medical Center in Kenner and 207-bed
Meadowcrest Hospital in Gretna - were damaged but are slowly
returning to service.
Dallas-based Tenet has hired New Orleans-based
Sizeler Architects to design the repair and construction of
facilities in the new network, which will be called the NOLA
Regional Health Network. Tenet plans to select a local market
leader for the new network shortly.
The cost of creating the new network
has not been determined, but Tenet estimates it could cost
"hundreds of millions of dollars." The company expects
a large portion of the cost to be covered by insurance settlements.
Tenet said it plans for the network
to include helping physicians associated with all Tenet facilities
reopen their practices and begin serving patients as soon
as possible, reopening Tenet's diagnostic imaging services
offices at multiple sites in New Orleans, reopening the New
Orleans Surgery and Heart Institute on the Memorial campus
within six months and restoring services at the Lindy Boggs
and Memorial downtown campuses.
"The Katrina tragedy offers us
a great opportunity to reinvent how we will offer our services,
based on the community's expected needs in the future,"
Fetter said. "We won't just rebuild traditional hospitals;
we will create a forward-looking network of health care services
focused on the needs of the 'new' New Orleans."
Tenet owns and operates acute care hospitals
and related services, including five hospitals in the Dallas
area.
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