$118 million outpatient care center could ease Ben Taub crowding
By TODD ACKERMAN
Copyright 2010 Houston Chronicle
Oct. 7, 2010, 10:27AM

The Harris County Hospital District broke ground on a $118 million outpatient care center Wednesday, a move to free up space at its crowded Ben Taub Hospital and make the district more competitive for paying patients.

The center, shelved last summer when the district said it would buy Memorial Hermann Southwest Medical Center and resurrected when the sale fell through two months later, will house the majority of diagnostic services and specialty clinics currently located at Ben Taub. It will be able to treat 162,000 patients a year, officials said.

"Patients who have a 10 o'clock appointment at the new center can count on getting in pretty close to 10 o'clock," said David Lopez, the district's president and chief executive officer. "Now, at Ben Taub, such patients run the risk of getting bumped because higher acuity patients take priority."

Lopez said having both inpatient and outpatient services at Ben Taub is inefficient and inadvertently encourages patients to go to the hospital even as the district wants them to go to one of its clinics.

Enthusiastic support
The new center, a five-story, 162,000-square-foot tower at the district's administrative headquarters near Reliant Stadium, is part of an ongoing $330 million expansion and renovation of the taxpayer-funded system. Another $35 million, probably more, will go toward a latter phase.

Wednesday's ceremonial event drew enthusiastic supporters such as state Reps. Al Green and Alma Allen, Harris County Judge Ed Emmett and County Commissioner El Franco Lee. But away from the program, County Commissioner Steve Radack questioned the wisdom of such a building project a few years before health reform figures to change the landscape of care in Harris County.

"The district is making a huge mistake investing this amount of taxpayer money when so many hospitals around the county are begging for patients," Radack said. "The district could contract out its outpatient services to those hospitals, putting them up for bid and saving taxpayers millions of dollars."

Because the project doesn't involve the acquisition of land, it did not come before Commisioner's Court for approval.

Stephen DonCarlos, chairman of the district board of managers, said that after studying healthcare reform, district officials decided their patient census won't decline because of the law, which is projected to add 750,000 to 800,000 newly insured people in Harris County when it takes full effect in 2014. Some observers expect many if not most of those people to use their insurance at private hospitals.

But DonCarlos said he thinks many companies and young people will pay the fine required by the law rather than purchase health insurance for their employees or themselves. He did not mention illegal immigrants, which could become the district's largest patient pool.

Some of the space freed up at Ben Taub will enable the hospital to convert patient rooms from four beds to two beds, part of the district's strategy to attract paying patients. That effort has already begun.

Acute care will benefit
But Lopez said most of the new space at Ben Taub will go toward acute care — "operating rooms, ICU rooms, whatever doctors feel are the most pressing needs at the time."

The outpatient center, scheduled for completion in 2012, will feature cancer treatment facilities, particularly radiation, that represent a significant upgrade over what is currently available at Ben Taub. It will also include 103 specialty exam rooms and an adjoining eight-level parking garage.

The district is scheduled to start construction early next year on a similar effort, priced at about $60 million, next to its Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital on the city's northeast side. Already under construction at LBJ is a new $49 million emergency center, which is January will replace the existing ER.

todd.ackerman@chron.com

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