When University Community Health opens its Pepin Heart Hospital & Dr. Kiran C. Patel Research Institute in February, the pulse of an already a competitive arena for cardiovascular services in Tampa Bay may quicken.
The hospital's all-digital information technologies and nearly paperless environment will improve patient outcomes and increase physician and staff satisfaction, boosting UCH's market share, said Brigitte Shaw, CEO of Pepin.
Shaw is projecting an annual 8 percent increase in the number of procedures performed starting in 2007. In 2005, UCH had $70 million in net revenue from 6,500 inpatient cardiovascular admissions and handled about 8,000 procedures, including 6,000 cardiac catheterizations and 1,000 surgeries.
"We will see our market share increase because physicians will choose to be here," Shaw said.
Competitive overview
It used to be only a handful of hospitals offered cardiovascular services, but that's no longer the case, said Deanna Nelson, executive VP for patient care services at Tampa General Hospital.
New heart programs are coming on line in Pasco and Hernando counties, and expansion projects are ongoing or recently completed at Tampa General, Morton Plant Hospital, St. Anthony's Health Care and Northside Hospital and Tampa Bay Heart Institute.
A 2004 survey by Corazon Consulting, a Pittsburgh firm that helps develop cardiovascular programs, found 78 percent of 101 hospitals surveyed nationally planned to expand or renovate their cardiac infrastructure.
Hospitals are focusing on cardiac care because it will be more prevalent as the population ages. It also is a more profitable line of business than many services, making up 25 percent to 60 percent of a hospital's bottom line, said Susan Heck, VP at Corazon. Successful cardiac programs can help offset money-losing programs that hospitals must offer to meet community needs, Heck said.
But not all cardiovascular services are equally profitable.
Hospitals make money on open-heart surgery, but surgeries are declining as interventional procedures such as angioplasty grow in popularity, said Phil Beauchamp, president and CEO of Morton Plant Mease Health Care. New cardiovascular technology, such as implantable defibrillators, is very costly and can be money-losers, Beauchamp said.
Staff and know-how
Cutting-edge information technology can help a heart program increase its market by broadening its service area, said Heck. But hospitals also need physicians and staff members who know how use the technology and changes in their processes to make the technology effective, she said.
"You have to have good doctors first," said Dr. Fadi Matar, a cardiologist at the Florida Cardiovascular Institute in South Tampa. Matar said doctors often choose where to practice based on proximity to their homes or their medical offices, not technology.
Still, technology can be a drawing card for doctors and nurses because it provides an improved quality of work life, said Vishal Wanchoo, president and CEO of GE Healthcare Information Technologies, a unit of General Electric Co. (NYSE: GE).
Shaw said two additional doctors have joined the staff since launching the heart hospital project, and Pepin is recruiting for a medical director who will lead cardiology residency programs in conjunction with University of South Florida. Two doctoral candidates from USF School of Nursing plan to work with Pepin, said Debora Martoccio, VP of patient care services and chief nursing officer.
Hard data
Much of the technology at Pepin already is in place at the Indiana Heart Hospital in Indianapolis and Saint Francis Heart Hospital in Tulsa, Okla., facilities GE Healthcare helped established earlier. At the center of the technology is a GE clinical information system that integrates waveforms, images, data and text into a single electronic medical record.
In a release in March, GE said there have been improvements in key benchmarks at each of the earlier hospitals. At Pepin, GE expects to gather additional hard evidence of the benefits that information technology systems produce for health care providers, Wanchoo said.
"It allows us to enter into relationships and partnerships with health care system with more confidence," Wanchoo said. "We can share risk with them."
National focus
Shaw expects the GE partnership will help build a brand image that will attract national attention to Pepin.
Other hospitals have their own approaches to boost recognition and patient volumes.
Tampa General is one of the top five heart transplant centers in the United States and also specializes in ventricular assist devices, a partial artificial heart, Nelson said. Physicians at the hospital have published their research in national medical journals.
The Heart Institute at St. Joseph's Hospital has specialized in performing a "micromaze" surgical procedure, drawing patients with atrial fibrillation from all over the country, said Pam D'Amore, administrative director. The institute also has hired a team of critical care trained nurses who are on site around the clock, meeting heart attack or stroke victims at the door and making sure they get services fast.
Morton Plant is focused on facility design, Beauchamp said, including the use of a "universal bed," a concept that allows patients to remain in the same bed from admission to discharge without transferring between units. That reduces errors and boosts nurse recruitment and retention because they get to see patients improve, the most rewarding part of their jobs, Beauchamp said.
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