LSU to buy site for hospital

• By MARSHA SHULER
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: Mar 28, 2008 - Page: 1B - UPDATED: 12:15 a.m.

• Print
• Email
• Save
• Share

• Del.icio.us
• Digg
• Facebook
• Reddit
• 

LSU will have property purchased for a new hospital in Baton Rouge by summer, the chief of hospital and medical education operations said Thursday.

Fred Cerise said he will deliver on a mandate from LSU System President John Lombardi to purchase property and begin hospital planning.

“I think that’s realistic. We are actively working this, and I think we will have something by summertime,” said Cerise, an LSU System vice president.

Cerise made the comments after ceremonies at which LSU opened a new outpatient surgery center at 9032 Perkins Road between Essen Lane and Bluebonnet Boulevard in south Baton Rouge.

The LSU Health System Surgical Facility will operate as a satellite of Earl K. Long Medical Center on Airline Highway at Greenwell Street in north Baton Rouge.

“It will take some of the stress off Earl K. Long,” said Jerry Shea, chairman of the LSU Board of Supervisors. “And I believe in the near future, we will be able to move forward with a replacement for Earl K. Long.”

LSU wants to abandon that facility in north Baton Rouge in favor of a new state of the art university hospital with trauma center somewhere in the medical corridor around Bluebonnet Boulevard and Essen Lane.

The state construction program includes $311.9 million in proposed borrowing to fund the 175-to-200-bed University Medical Center in Baton Rouge.

There is $9 million in general state borrowing in the top funding category for property purchase and project planning. The remaining $302.9 million is in revenue bonds — borrowing repaid with revenue from hospital operations. Most of those dollars will come from care of the uninsured.

In recent days, the Jindal administration has questioned the business plans for LSU’s construction of a major medical complex in partnership with the U.S. Veterans Administration in New Orleans. That plan also relies on a large commitment of federal dollars received for the care of the uninsured.

“I expect them to take a critical look at whatever we put forward,” Cerise said. “We know we need to get out of Earl K. Long” because hospital and medical education accrediting bodies are putting the pressure on LSU to do just that.

The new Perkins Road surgical outpatient center is the latest in a series of actions LSU has taken to move services away from the Airline Highway hospital and into the community where people live.

A new state-of-the-art outpatient clinic is under construction down the street from EKL. It also has a Mid-City clinic at the site of the old Stanocola Building off North Foster and an outreach clinic at the Leo S. Butler Community Center.