Dive Brief:
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The Maryland Health Care Commissioner has called for the new Prince George's County Regional Medical Center to be scaled back by at least $100 million to get his approval for a “certificate of need,” as reported by the Washington Business Journal.
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Commissioner Robert Moffit recommended capping the total cost at $543 million rather than $655 million by cutting the number of beds, reducing the number or size of operating room suites and the capacity of the emergency department.
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The partners for the planned teaching hospital - Dimensions Healthcare System and the University of Maryland Medical System - said they would alter and resubmit their application by Aug. 31, the Washington Post reported.
Dive Insight:
Moffit's concerns came down to the planned hospital being bigger than the market can bear and whether it would be financially stable given Dimensions' difficulty operating the existing Prince George’s Hospital Center in Cheverly, according to the Washington Post.
He suggested the partners should be more conservative in projecting how many patients they would attract and how much revenue they would generate in light of the trend toward shorter admissions.
Yet not everyone agreed with Moffit's assessment. State senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert), who sponsored a bill to fund the new hospital, stood by the partners.
“It’s just unbelievable,” Miller told the Post. “The hospital will serve all of Southern Maryland, and instead of being scaled back, it needs to be allowed to grow.”
The hospital, sought not only for the improved healthcare but the economic development it would bring, has been pushed back by numerous delays from a planned 2017 opening to 2020 or later.