Hudsonhubtimes.com - Medical center opposes plan for new hospital

by Andree Niswander

Reporter

Hudson -- Plans for a prospective physician-owned, for-profit local hospital are gathering momentum, with the cities of Hudson, Stow, Cuyahoga Falls and Summit County on board for the project. But a would-be competitor of the facility has come out publicly against the plan.

Akron General Medical Center administrators and physicians do not agree with a proposed new Summa Health System medical center, according to Dr. Thomas Stover, senior vice president of medical affairs and chief medical officer.

"There are a number of reasons why this particular facility is not needed," said Stover in an interview. "We don't need another hospital ... and a for-profit facility ... puts the not-for-profits at risk, because of our mission."

But with no centrally-located inpatient facility between Bedford and Cuyahoga Falls, a new hospital would benefit the community, said Tom Strauss, Summa Health System president and CEO.

"We believe that ... we will meet the growing health care needs of the residents of the northern region of Summit County and the southern region of Cuyahoga County," he said.

Although an Akron General Medical Center advertisement in another newspaper publication recently criticized the proposed Summa project, Summa officials declined to comment regarding the ad.

"We prefer not to make any assumptions about the intentions of Akron General," Strauss said.

The exact site for the future Summa Health System hospital has not been decided, but the three cities April 24 pledged to cooperatively develop the Seasons Road area near Route 8 as a joint economic development zone to encourage Summa to build a hospital there.

Summit County Council also committed to developing the site at its Aug. 11 meeting.

An interchange project connecting Seasons Road to Route 8 is slated for completion in 2010, which will make the site more accessible for Summa or other developers.

In a recent interview, Summa Care System Public Relations Manager Mike Bernstein said there is no hospital site decision deadline, but "Seasons Road remains our best choice."

Near the proposed Summa site and part of the Akron General Health System, the Akron General Health and Wellness Center North is situated at 1320 Corporate Drive in Stow.

Building a for-profit hospital so close to the non-profit Akron General Medical Center, its satellite facilities and Akron City Hospital "potentially puts us under," according to Stover.

Akron General Medical Center and its satellite facilities would lose insured patients to the for-profit hospital, Stover said, making it difficult for them to continue operating and providing for uninsured patients. He claimed the Summa facility would turn away uninsured patients, but Strauss said that won't be the case.

At the prospective new Summa facility, all people needing care will be taken care of regardless of their ability to pay, said Strauss.

"It's important to know that in our agreement with the physicians, we have the reserved powers necessary to ensure that the new hospital operates in a manner which preserves Summa Health System's tax-exempt status and that it adopts a charity care policy consistent with [our] policy," he said.

Stover also claimed there's a basic conflict of interest at play, when physicians own the hospital to which they send their patients, he added.

"There's a significant number of people who end up being in-patients, who don't need to be," according to the American Medical Association, he said.

Strauss said that Summa officials "don't believe that to be true."

Health care and community interests have been at the forefront of planning for the prospective new facility, Strauss said.

"At Summa, we trust our doctors to make decisions that are in the best interests of our patients, and it remains our expectation that our patients will be treated where it is determined by their doctors to be most appropriate medically," he said.

E-mail: aniswander@recordpub.com

Phone: 330-686-3947