An independent study on the Hospital's need for beds is now available for download as a 2MB PDF: Field Associates Bed Study. This professional study used the Washington State Department of Health's standard methodology for calculating the Hospital's bed needs. This is the methodology that the Hospital would be required to use to gain Dept. of Health approval for adding beds. The two most surprising findings (emphasis added):
"CHRMC proposes ten times more new capacity than this study finds is warranted through application of the Department [of Health]’s method."
"In Seattle, Swedish Hospital’s inpatient pediatric services now care for more King County children than does CHRMC."Further excerpts from the study:
"Children’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center (CHRMC) is proposing ... approximately 350 new inpatient beds. ...
Based on the Department’s published method of distributing hospital beds across the state, this study finds no support for the addition of inpatient beds to CHRMC’s current capacity of 250 beds until after the the year 2015. A small increase in beds – up to 40 – may be warranted by the year 2026 (the very end of CHRMC’s 15- to 20-year master plan planning horizon. ...
CHRMC’s proposal of 350 new beds appears to be approximately ten times the actual number required at CHRMC twenty years from today. ...
In light of such an oversupply... the CHRMC Master Plan can be expected to have unwanted impacts on the financial and program viability of other hospitals and to unnecessarily increase the cost of health care both locally and in the state. Under-used hospital beds put extra costs into the health care system, thus driving up the taxes and health care premiums we all pay to support it. As the Washington legislature stated, when hospitals over-build, “that excess capacity of health services and facilities place considerable economic burden on the public.” [RCW 43.370.030(2)(a)]"
