Sentara, Bon Secours seek joint hospital in Va. Beach

Competing health-care organizations Bon Secours Virginia and Sentara Health announced a joint proposal yesterday for a 200-bed hospital in the Princess Anne section of Virginia Beach. It would require approval from the State Health Commission.

Bon Secours and Sentara had come up short with separate plans for new hospitals in Virginia Beach. Bon Secours' proposal for a 90-bed hospital was turned down in March, while Sentara received permission for a hospital with 120 beds, fewer than it wanted. Both companies have appealed in court.

Under the new plan, they would drop their appeals and work together on a hospital on land owned by Sentara. Both companies would offer to reduce the number of inpatient beds at two hospitals they own nearby, and move those beds into a new Sentara Princess Anne Hospital.

Bon Secours Virginia, a not-for-profit health system, consists of units in Richmond, with four hospitals, and Hampton Roads, with three hospitals. About 6,600 people work at Bon Secours Richmond operations and 4,100 are employed with Bon Secours Hampton Roads.

Michael Spine, senior vice president for development for Bon Secours Virginia, said the companies will apply to the state this month for approval of the project, and hope for a public hearing in January. The companies say they could open the proposed hospital in 2010.

Howard Kern, president and chief executive of Sentara, said in a statement that the combined hospital would make efficient use of both companies' health-care resources "and avoid the uncertainty, expense and delay of continued appeals" to the health commission.

The plan would include the not-for-profit hospital and some ancillary services such as diagnostic imaging on outpatient campuses the two companies operate near the site.

Sentara, also a not-for-profit company, consists of more than 100 care sites in southeastern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina, including seven hospitals. It has 15,000 employees.

The notion of a jointly run hospital is not new to Bon Secours. Officials said it has jointly run health-care facilities since 1998 with Roper Health System in Charleston, S.C.
Contact Bill Geroux at (757) 498-2820 or .