RiverBend a perfect hospital site.

Byline: GUEST VIEWPOINT By Jan Oliver and Jack Courtemanche For The Register-Guard

In a community of divergent views and strong opinions, we may all agree on at least one thing: Building a new hospital is hard work. As both Springfield and Eugene struggle to clear the hurdles that stand between the vision and the reality of two brand new hospitals, The Register-Guard focuses too much on the land use battles and too little on the implications for health care in our community.

We are on the Design Review Committee for the RiverBend hospital, which is close to our hearts. We agree wholeheartedly with Dr. Roger Ulrich, an international expert on the effect of hospital design on patient health, who visited Eugene recently. Ulrich said RiverBend will set the standard nationally, and possibly internationally, for outstanding patient care.

Unfortunately, The Register-Guard, which covers every land use development in detail, did not bother to cover Ulrich's visit. The newspaper missed an opportunity to help the public understand what awesome power the RiverBend site has to improve patient outcomes, reduce costs and improve our quality of life.

As part of our design review work, we have visited hospitals throughout the United States. Nothing compares to the potential we have at RiverBend.

Sacred Heart Medical Center is bursting at the seams. There is simply no room at our current site to add the facilities needed to handle current demand, much less care for an aging and growing population. We operate a 425-bed hospital on less than four city blocks - less space than any other major medical center in Oregon.

We need not recap the history of trying to rebuild a new hospital on our current site, followed by efforts to build at the Crescent Avenue site. Both were met with insurmountable political hurdles. The local PeaceHealth board has spent more than five years trying to solve our space problems. We have examined every conceivable site in excruciating detail, including the Eugene Water & Electric Board site, which is far too small for a regional medical center like Sacred Heart.

RiverBend is not only the perfect site for a hospital built around a healing environment. It is also the only site where we had the political support we need to succeed. Springfield city leaders and staff have toiled heroically to get us to this point. PeaceHealth is absolutely committed to the RiverBend site. If the courts prevent us from pursuing the dream, we will have to accept that. But nothing else comes close to achieving the community benefit of RiverBend.

The compromise suggested by our opponents is to move the hospital away from the river and put it on the new Martin Luther King Parkway, with parking between the hospital and the river. Under the current plan, the new hospital will be set back from the river approximately 500 feet, far more than is being proposed under the new Eugene hospital development plan at the EWEB site.

While an even greater setback might make our opponents, who live across the river from us, more comfortable, it would deprive patients of the healing value of the river. Research shows that the closer patients are to the river, the faster they heal and the less pain they experience.

That saves money and alleviates human suffering. One expert recently told us the hospital should be even closer to the river to take advantage of its healing qualities. We agree. Yet we have attempted to reach a balance and a compromise.

It appears that the Eugene City Council is attempting to atone for its decision in 2001 to stop discussions with PeaceHealth as we tried to find a way to keep one of the state's largest medical centers near downtown. From the reaction we've seen to the council's preliminary decision to grant a $25 million subsidy to the for-profit Triad Hospitals Inc., we're not the only ones who see the irony in this.

Before the council gets too carried away, it would do well to remember that PeaceHealth has long-standing plans to invest more than $65 million in upgrades to the Hilyard campus where we will continue to operate a hospital with at least 48 beds after RiverBend opens. Approximately 1,800 PeaceHealth employees will work at Eugene's Hilyard campus, more than twice the number offered by Triad. Road and other improvements will be necessary. We trust the Eugene City Council will extend the same or greater considerations to the nonprofit hospital that has served this region for nearly 70 years as it does to a Texas-based corporation that has barely been in existence for five.

We hope The Register-Guard will devote more coverage to health care, not just land use, and that elected leaders will treat both local hospitals fairly and equitably. We look forward to an end to lawsuits and the beginning of construction, which will signal the beginning of a new chapter in better health care in our community.

Jan Oliver and Jack Courtemanche are members of the PeaceHealth board of directors.