Children’s hospital deal made
San José could have its own children’s hospital in about four years as Stanford’s Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital and Valley Medical Center have decided to partner on the estimated $75 million project. If completed, San José no longer would carry the distinction of being the largest city in the country without its own children’s hospital.
Officials say the 75-to-100-bed hospital would be built on Valley Medical Center’s campus at the corner of Bascom and Moorpark avenues, near downtown San José. The facility would be attached to the existing hospital, and Packard will contract with Valley for some services.
The entity responsible for pulling Packard and Valley Medical Center together was the Silicon Valley Children’s Hospital Foundation, a group of local business leaders, parents and pediatricians who are dedicated to improving children's health care in San José. The foundation will play a key role in raising the $75 million to $100 million needed to build the new hospital.
The three institutions immediately will begin work to confirm the financial feasibility of the project and to identify the programs and services to be provided at the hospital. Officials will bring the hospitals and community pediatricians together to help plan the project.
“We want to make this an inclusive process,” says Christopher Dawes, chief executive officer of Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital. Success depends on the participation of community pediatricians, business leaders and parents, he says.
But the project isn’t a done deal until the financial feasibility study proves that it can work. The final decision on whether or not to move forward with the proposed hospital is expected to be made by year end, says Mr. Dawes. People involved with the project are optimistic the hospital will be built.
The proposed hospital likely would be financed with existing funds, bonds and philanthropy.
“I'm not going to ask the David and Lucile Packard Foundation to support this effort,” says Mr. Dawes. But he doesn’t foresee any problem with raising the money to build a hospital.
Physicians from the community, Packard and Valley Medical Center will practice at the hospital. Currently, pediatric residents from the Stanford University School of Medicine train at both hospitals. Any programs at the new hospital would be an extension of those currently offered at Packard. Cardiology and organ transplant programs will remain in Palo Alto exclusively.
At this point, the plan is to build a 75-to-100-bed facility to be owned and operated by Packard. Valley Medical Center was chosen as a partner because it already provides the most pediatric services in the South Bay and has plenty of land to build the new facility.
San José’s O’Connor Hospital also had been considered for the partnership with Packard, but it doesn’t have as much land as Valley and currently offers few pediatric services. But O’Connor officials say they are still interested in expanding their own pediatric services.
The new hospital would be 20 miles south of Packard, which is located in Palo Alto at the northern tip of Santa Clara County.
An expansion of pediatric services is needed for two primary reasons, supporters say: Traffic routes and congestion make Packard difficult to access by physicians and some parents, and Packard often is full because its programs are becoming well-known nationwide.
Meanwhile, in Santa Clara County the population of children is mostly growing toward the county’s southern end.
“Packard is an extremely busy place,” says Dr. Jeffrey Kanel, a San José pediatric orthopedic surgeon who is on the medical advisory council for the Silicon Valley Children’s Hospital Foundation. “They are overflowing and actively redirecting some patients to other hospitals because they don't have the space.”
Dr. Kanel has an office in San José near Good Samaritan Hospital but does surgery at several hospitals in the county. At one time he tried to work out of Packard but one unpredictable traffic jam would easily throw him off schedule, he says.
Ideally, Dr. Kanel would like to practice in one place dedicated to pediatric services and not have to travel around town. He says quality of care improves when these services are concentrated in one location.
“Valley was the logical solution,” says Dr. Kanel, because it already has an extensive pediatric operation.
This deal also would help Valley Medical Center financially. Packard would pay the county for the land use, says Bob Sillen, executive director of the Santa Clara County Health and Hospital System, which operates valley medical center. “We are talking about substantial lease payments.”
If the hospital is built, pediatric services likely would become very competitive in San José. Kaiser Permanente already controls about a third of the market and plans to establish a pediatric center at its new $800 million Santa Clara Hospital, which is expected to open in a few years.
Good Samaritan Hospital and Regional Medical Center San José also plan to expand pediatric services during the next four to five years when their new hospital expansions open.
“I think Packard will be formidable competition,” says Bill Piche, chief executive officer of Good Samaritan Hospital. “But our plans have not changed.”
There has been some concern that many pediatricians in San José are not on board with this project. But Dr. Kanel says the contrary.
“I think the vast majority of doctors in the county are on board because I’ve spoken with most of them,” says Dr. Kanel. “When this facility is a reality, I don’t believe for a minute that doctors won't use it.”
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