Ohio hospital one step ahead of specialists

If you can't beat 'em, take their land -- or at least what you think might become their land.

By Katherine Vogt, amednews staff. June 16, 2003.

A nonprofit community hospital in Ohio is using a novel tactic, more likely to be employed by big businesses, to prevent a specialty hospital from cropping up nearby.

Licking Community Hospital in Newark, about 35 miles east of Columbus, leased 13 acres of land that executives feared would become home to a for-profit specialty hospital capable of, in the hospital's mind, siphoning off the most profitable cases in the area.

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Region: Midwest

"We've taken some action to prevent what folks in the industry are referring to as a boutique hospital from coming into our local community," said Pamela Watkins, vice president of human resources for Licking Memorial Health Systems, which owns the 221-bed hospital.

The group that would be building this hospital has not announced, at least through local media, its intentions to build one, much less where it would be built. But Watkins said her hospital's chief executive officer had heard from other health care executives that an expansion to the Newark Surgery Center was being considered. She said it was believed that the outpatient surgery center, owned by local physicians, was planning to buy land behind it to add inpatient beds, essentially creating a specialty hospital.

On May 8, Licking Memorial leased the land, just a couple of miles away, with an option to buy it in the future. Watkins declined to say how much the hospital paid.

Phone messages seeking comment from the chief executive of Newark Surgery Center were not returned, and an operator said no one else could address media inquiries. In previous media reports, the surgery center said it would neither confirm nor deny any rumored plans.

Elsewhere, proponents of specialty hospitals, which typically focus on a narrow range of procedures such as orthopedic or cardiac surgery, have said the facilities can produce better results at a lower cost than general hospitals.

Watkins said hospital leaders weren't sure exactly what they would do with the property, but they were hopeful the move would stop an inpatient facility from being built.

"It is very difficult for us to absorb a boutique hospital that takes away those profitable lines that enable us to provide charity care and the other services we provide," she said. "It is a very serious issue. ... For some hospitals it is a survival issue."