
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 20, 1994                   TAG: 9404210020
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-2   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG                                LENGTH: Medium

CANCER CENTER STILL ON HOLD BY BRIAN KELLEY STAFF WRITER

A cancer treatment center for the New River Valley remains on hold, 11 weeks after a state board urged two competing hospitals to create a joint proposal.

Executives with Pulaski and Radford community hospitals said talks over their competing proposals are scheduled to resume within the next 10 days.

According to Christopher Dux, chief executive officer at Pulaski Community, the two hospitals haven't been able to agree on a meeting time until now.

Susan Lockwood, a spokeswoman for Radford Community, said she didn't know the details of why that's been the case.

On Feb. 2, the Southwest Virginia Health Systems Agency Board of Directors recommended denial of both hospitals' applications for a certificate of need from the state.

The board instead encouraged the for-profit Pulaski hospital and the nonprofit Radford institution to work together.

One board member doubted then such an arrangement would work and compared it to a shotgun marriage.

That's because four months of similar talks last year led nowhere after disagreements on where the center would be located, who would manage it and how patient charges would be structured.

Radford Community had proposed building a freestanding center on Virginia 177, where it wants to move its main hospital by 1998. Pulaski Community proposed building the center next to its existing hospital on U.S. 11. Both proposals envision a cost of more than $3 million.

The locations are a 10-minute drive apart. Until a new center is built, cancer patients in the New River Valley and counties beyond will continue to have to drive to Roanoke, Salem, Richlands, Bristol or Winston-Salem for radiation therapy.

The state is holding off on the next step in the certificate of need procedure pending the outcome of the negotiations, according to Mary Beth Sisco, health planning associate with the Southwest Virginia Health Systems Agency.

Typically, once the board recommends denial, applicants next appear at a fact-finding conference run by an independent hearing officer appointed by the state health commissioner.

Once that officer makes a recommendation, the health commissioner then issues a ruling on the application.

by CNB