By Fareeha Ali October 21, 2014 - Central DuPage Hospitals eight-year-old affiliation with Lurie childrens hospital has attracted so many patients that the west suburban facility wants to expand its pediatric units, a sharp contrast with the trend at several other area hospitals. The Winfield-based hospital is proposing a $14 million expansion and modernization of pediatric and neonatal intensive care services, according to an application it filed recently with the Illinois Health Facilities Services Review Board, which must approve the changes. The pediatrics unit at Central DuPage, staffed with specialists from Ann & Robert H. Lurie Childrens Hospital of Chicago, had a 132 percent occupancy rate in 2013, up from 93 percent seven years ago, the application said. The hospital wants to add 12 beds to its 10-bed pediatrics unit and six beds to the 23-bed neonatal intensive care unit. “We have seen large numbers of patients due to the specialty care offered here,” Central DuPage spokesman Christopher King said. “The expansion would accommodate for transfer patients we have had to deny in the past and grow our subspecialty care that Luries downtown facility offers.” In 2013, Central DuPage couldnt accept 32 pediatric patients that other hospitals wanted to transfer. The facility had to place 157 pediatric patients in other units not designed for children, the application said. The hospital is projecting nearly 140 percent occupancy in 2014 and 148 percent in 2015. The occupancy is projected to drop to 80 percent in 2018, two years after the proposed expansion is scheduled to be complete. AGAINST THE TREND Central DuPage is one of two hospitals in the Winfield-based Cadence Health system. In September, Cadence became part of Streeterville-based Northwestern Memorial Healthcare, also a two-hospital system, creating a combined network with about $3 billion in revenue. Northwestern also is affiliated with Lurie. Central DuPage is investing in its pediatric services at a time when other hospitals have been reducing them, citing fewer children who need care. For instance, Northwestern Lake Forest Hospital last year discontinued its 10-bed pediatric unit and instead is treating children in medical-surgical beds, the most common multipurpose category of inpatient beds. Similarly, St. Francis Hospital in Evanston shut down its 12-bed pediatric unit in 2013, and Riverside Medical Center in Kankakee shut down its 18-bed pediatrics unit this year. THE LURIE BRAND “Increases in pediatric utilization at CDH, while most hospitals are experiencing decreases, are primarily the result of the Cadence Healths major clinical affiliation with Lurie Childrens,” the application said. That affiliation, which started in 2006, brought Lurie specialists and specialty care programs to Central DuPage. Currently, about 90 Lurie pediatricians maintain staff privileges at the hospital and about 30 practice there full-time, a Lurie spokeswoman said. “We want to be able to keep kids in their own communities,” said Jill Keats, chief program development officer at Lurie. “With this partnership, we have been able to increase quality care, service and outcome to families closer to their homes” in the suburbs. Lurie, which specializes in treating the sickest children, has mostly patients from Cook County at its Streeterville facility, which is blocks away from its academic partner, Northwestern Universitys Feinberg School of Medicine. In an effort to expand its services to the suburbs without having families travel downtown, the childrens hospital began partnering with other hospitals and now has 13 affiliates across the Chicago area. Branching out to the suburbs is important because thats where the kids are, said Lurie spokeswoman Julie Pesch. In 2013, 65 percent of births occurred in hospitals in the suburbs, while 35 percent of births occurred in hospitals in Chicago, according to data Lurie provided from Cook, DuPage, Kane, Will, Lake, McHenry, DeKalb, LaSalle and Kendall counties. “Theres definitely a relationship with the brand name of Lurie” and the growing number of pediatrics patients, said Doug Fenstermaker, a Chicago-based vice president of health care at Warbird Consulting Partners LLC. “When people see the affiliation, they think the quality of care is linked, and with the (Lurie) physicians actually working (at Central DuPage), then that link is not just theoretical, but a reality.” Lurie has the largest market share of pediatric hospital care in the area, with 24 percent, followed by Downers Grove-based Advocate Health Care with nearly 17 percent, according to a Feb. 7 report from credit rating agency Standard & Poors Rating Services. chicagobusiness/article/20141021/NEWS03/141029988/with-a-boost-from-lurie-central-dupage-wants-to-expand/healthcare
Posted on: Tue, 21 Oct 2014 18:10:18 +0000
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