St. Bernard Parish Hospital is nearly ready to offer health care close ...

Nearly seven years after Hurricane Katrina and the levee breaks combined to destroy the lone hospital in St. Bernard Parish, the 113,000-square-foot public St. Bernard Parish Hospital is nearly complete, with just some floor waxing and minor electric work remaining. A new MRI sits in a first-floor room wrapped in plastic like a gift from outer space. Construction workers filter in and out, removing wall tiles to test alarm systems, lighting and WiFi signals.

And giving visitors a sense or home, the hospital?s logo ? a wavy heartbeat line that bisects a fleur-de-lis ? dots each corridor, and a large two-story map of the marshes surrounding St. Bernard lines the entrance.

Construction is expected to wrap up this month, and then the hospital must pass a state certification and accreditation process that local officials hope will be finalized by mid- or late August. Construction of an adjacent 60,000-square-foot medical office building is expected to wrap up this fall.

Both facilities sit between West Judge Perez Drive and St. Bernard Highway on a 23-acre tract that was donated by the Arlene and Joseph Meraux Foundation, the private entity created to oversee charitable spending fueled by the Meraux fortune.

?The hospital should give St. Bernard residents peace of mind,? said Wayne Landry, chairman of the Hospital Service District Board. ?You don?t have to go into the city anymore, sometimes in the middle of the night, to get health care.?

Since the privately owned, 196-bed Chalmette Medical Center was demolished in February 2007, the parish has had a health clinic run out of trailers by the nonprofit Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System, but no emergency room or full-service hospital.

Now, Landry and other officials are trying to get word out about the new hospital.

Using the hospital

Only 48 percent of St. Bernard residents used Chalmette Medical Center before Katrina, ?meaning 52 percent of people passed it up,? Landry said. He implored residents to use the hospital, explaining that ?at the end of the day, this is a business.?

In its first five months of operation, the hospital budget anticipates about $10.1 million in operating expenses against only $5.8 million in patient revenue. Overall operating expenses for 2012 are expected to reach about $13.7 million.

Expecting such shortfalls in the hospital?s first three years of operation, parish residents in November 2010 passed a 10-year, 8-mill tax that will generate an estimated $2.3 million annually.

Backed by the tax revenue, the hospital will be able to borrow between $14 million and $16 million to keep afloat in its infancy. The remainder of the money will pay the interest on borrowing that money up front.

Hospital Chief Executive Officer Tim Burke said that for the hospital to survive, it also must attract physicians, and he said residents must play a part in that.

?If you want your physician here, you have just as much force in that as we do,? Burke said.

Last week, a who?s who of St. Bernard movers and shakers received a tour of the facility. Landry led that group, which included Sheriff Jimmy Pohlmann, St. Bernard school Superintendent Doris Voitier, attorney Walter Leger, parish Chamber of Commerce Chief Executive Officer Stephen Reuther, and many other chamber members, local business owners and area officials.

Building the parish

Reuther said the hospital is an important step in bringing people back to St. Bernard. Before Katrina, the parish had about 65,000 people, whereas now it has about 40,000.

The hospital has 40 patient beds: eight intensive care, four long-term care and 28 general inpatient. There also are four operating suites, two endoscopy suites and 10 beds in the emergency room.

Currently, each of the patient rooms is private, but Landry said an extra bed could be added if needed ?so pretty much overnight we could double the capacity.? And he said the hospital has the infrastructure to support a fourth floor, which could add 110 beds. Landry also said there are eight to nine additional acres available for possible expansion.

The three-story medical office building, which will include a free clinic and offices for about 12 doctors, could be complete as soon as early September but construction is more likely to continue through October or even November because of anticipated weather delays. It has about 38,000 square feet of rental space and it already has soft commitments for 11,000 square feet, or about six doctors in either group practice or private offices, according to Burke.

The Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System will operate the hospital with Frank Folino as the administrator. He previously managed the local health clinic for the Franciscans, but that clinic has since been transferred over to the St. Charles Community Health Center?s control.

Free clinic will move

That free clinic, currently run out of units at 7718 W. Judge Perez Drive in Arabi, will be transferred to the second floor of the medical office building through a $2 million FEMA grant.

Together, the hospital and medical office building cost about $83 million. The money comes from $46 million in federal Community Development Block Grants, $5 million of which is through the state?s local infrastructure program, $17 million in state capital outlay money, $11.6 million in new market tax credits, $1.3 million from a federal Health Resources and Services Administration grant, and $2 million from FEMA for the transfer of the clinic.

Construction of the main hospital came to about $70 million, while the medical office building will cost about $13 million, including about $5 million in local infrastructure CDBG money, $6 million in the new market tax credits and the $2 million in FEMA funds.

In acknowledgement of hurricanes, the hospital has two back-up generators. The first would run within 10 seconds of power going out and would provide electricity to essential functions, and the second could be turned on when needed to serve the rest of the hospital. Each could supply power for up to a week.

Benjamin Alexander-Bloch can be reached at bbloch@timespicayune.com or 504.826.3321.

Source: http://www.nola.com/health/index.ssf/2012/07/st_bernard_hospital_offers_hea.html

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