Estimate for cost of hospital increases.

Byline: TIM CHRISTIE The Register-Guard

PeaceHealth's corporate board on Friday approved a higher cost estimate to build a new hospital in Cottage Grove, clearing the way for construction to begin in the next two to three months.

Total cost of the hospital, clinic and final land acquisition is just over $12 million, said Alan Yordy, chief executive officer of PeaceHealth in Oregon. The previous construction estimate was $9.7 million.

PeaceHealth's share will be about $10 million and the community will be asked to raise $2.1 million, the same amount previously sought, he said.

The community fund-raising campaign was supposed to kick off last month, but PeaceHealth officials postponed it because the higher construction estimate needed approval from the corporate board in Bellevue, Wash.

Costs increased in part because PeaceHealth officials decided to make the imaging department at the new hospital completely digital. Images such as X-rays, CT scans and mammographies are now developed onto large sheets of film, then trucked to Sacred Heart Medical Center in Eugene, where radiologists read the images, dictate their findings and send the reports back to Cottage Grove.

By building a filmless, digital imaging department, those images can be transmitted electronically to Eugene over high-speed data lines. And they can be stored on compact discs, taking up far less room than film requires.

PeaceHealth plans to go with a similar system at its new hospital in north Springfield, Yordy said, so using it first in Cottage Grove will provide an opportunity to test the technology.

The added expense - about $750,000 - required approval from PeaceHealth's corporate board, he said. The Oregon regional board doesn't have authority to approve such an expenditure, he said.

PeaceHealth also plans to buy about six more acres for the new hospital, in addition to the 9 1/2 acres it previously bought.

Construction should begin in 60 to 90 days and take 12 to 14 months, meaning the hospital should open in late 2003. PeaceHealth has received zoning and land use approval from the Cottage Grove City Council.

The 40,000-square-foot hospital is to be built east of Interstate 5 at Village Drive, near Middlefield Village and the Cottage Theatre. It would have 15 beds plus an emergency department, labs, radiology facility, doctors' offices, gift shop and 30-seat community room.

The hospital would replace the 11-bed Cottage Grove Community Hospital at 1340 Birch Ave. Most patients will come from south Lane and north Douglas counties. Construction had been scheduled to begin by early summer.

PeaceHealth took over management of the Cottage Grove hospital after it closed because of bankruptcy in 1998.

PeaceHealth initially agreed to spend $4.5 million for a new hospital and later raised its commitment to $7.7 million.

PeaceHealth, a Catholic health care system based in Bellevue, operates five hospitals and other health care ventures in Oregon, Washington and Alaska, including Sacred Heart Medical Center in Eugene and PeaceHarbor Hospital in Florence.