$7.3 million expansion announced by LCRH

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June 4, 2009

Hospital will add 45 new rooms this fall making it one of the largest rural medical facilities in Kentucky

By BILL MARDIS, Editor Emeritus The Commonwealth Journal Thu Jun 04, 2009, 07:16 PM EDT

Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital will begin a $7.3 million expansion this fall to add 45 new beds, making it one of the largest rural hospitals in Kentucky with a total of 304 beds when construction is complete in 2011.

Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services, Division of Certificate of Need, in March approved the additional beds for the Somerset hospital. First public announcement of the addition was made Tuesday during the June membership meeting of the Somerset-Pulaski County Chamber of Commerce.

“We hope to have the new beds ready for the flu season in 2011,” said Jeff Seraphine, president and CEO of Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital. Construction is expected to start during the fourth quarter this year and the project will take about a year to complete.

Some 33 of the new beds will be on the fourth floor of the hospital tower erected in 2005. Seraphine said this space was left a “shell” area for future expansion when the tower was built. Another 12 beds will be added during current renovation of the hospital that started two years ago and is expected to be completed in October. Between eight and 12 of the new beds will be critical care and the remainder medical and surgical, he said.

Seraphine said application for the additional beds was made last October. Approval was not based on need for new hospital beds in the local planning area, but on the occupancy rate of Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital that exceeds the state’s threshold, he revealed. The Division of Certificate of Need’s approval is mandatory to prevent proliferation of health care facilities that would increase cost of quality health care.

Seraphine said Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital stays busy. “We will admit 13,000 people this year; we will do 12,000 surgeries; some 36,000 people will come through the Emergency Room; and we will have between 65,000 to 70,000 outpatient visits.” He said patients often must wait in the Emergency Room or other areas of the hospital until a bed is available.

About 40 percent of patients at Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital comes from outside Pulaski County, Seraphine said. The hospital’s primary service area is Pulaski, McCreary, Russell, Wayne and Clinton counties.

Seraphine said the Somerset hospital is growing because of the need for its heart, neurosurgical, orthopedic, bariatric and gastroenterology programs.

“We are such a regional hospital ... so many of our services are not performed at other area hospitals,” he noted. The hospital has grown tremendously since is was built by Humana in 1976. Humana succeeded the municipally owned Somerset City Hospital that was located at 525 Bourne Avenue in the building now occupied by Britthaven.

Humana later sold the hospital to Columbia HCA, a health-care conglomerate that later split into three parts, one of which is LifePoint, headquartered in Brentwood, Tenn. and the current owner of Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital.

One of the Pulaski County’s largest employers, Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital has 1,200 employees and an annual payroll of about $65 million.

The hospital has an active medical staff of 130 physicians. “Within the last two-and-a-half years we’ve spent about $6 million on recruitment of 35 doctors,’ Seraphine said.

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Pulaski carries Girdler to win

In the weeks leading up to Tuesday’s primary election, it was impossible to miss the colorful signs dotting nearly every Pulaski roadway. The names in the race for the 15th State Senatorial District seat popped out: A.C. Donahue. Chris Girdler. Mark Polston.

Once citizens hit the ballots, however, the results mirrored the dimensions of the signs themselves: Chris Girdler stood the tallest.

Girdler, deputy district director for Congressman Harold “Hal” Rogers, ran away with the votes inside Pulaski County’s borders, earning 3,926 votes for 62.05 percent of the total number cast.

That number more than doubled the next highest vote-getter, businessman Mark Polston, who raked in 1,624 votes for 25.67 percent.

However, Polston — who owns Classic Carpet, a home-flooring business located just off the southern 914 bypass — can claim a moral victory ... three of them, in fact. In all three counties in the district other than Pulaski — those being Adair, Casey, and Russell Counties — Polston actually edged out Girdler.

In Adair, Polston beat Girdler 629 to 394. In Casey County, it was 538 to 417, and in Russell, it was 1,862 to 1,038.

Polston said he just “couldn’t pull it out with the numbers” and that “the machine worked for” Girdler in Pulaski County.

“I think that was their strategy — I think they had a Pulaski County strategy all along,” said Polston. “They played the political game well.”

Polston said the difference between his and Girdler’s campaigns was that “mine was a very, very grass roots campaign,” he said. “I did not have a political machine behind me. I understand how this process works, and in this instance, he prevailed.”

As for why Girdler didn’t take three of four counties, the winning candidate — since there are no Democrats in the race, winning the Republican primary was effectively a final victory for Girdler — said he didn’t have an answer for that.

However, “I believe things happen for a reason and I hope the long and strenuous campaign will only heighten my desire to move beyond the bitterness and partisanship of the recent past,” said Girdler.

“Regionalism is a goal of mine, and I look forward to helping all four counties,” he added, noting that he campaigned heavily in each of them.

Sen. Vernie McGaha, the long-time state senator whose seat the candidates were vying for, actually supported Polston after Liberty’s Todd Hoskins dropped out of the race earlier this month.

Donahue, a local attorney, got 556 votes in Pulaski County, 8.79 percent of the vote. He only received 145 votes in Russell County, 74 in Adair County, and 75 in Casey County, where hometown candidate Hoskins almost matched him with 71 votes despite no longer being officially in the race.

Polston said he’s “still digesting” what happened, and though “the process has been a very good experience for me,” he wouldn’t commit to running again in the future. “I wouldn’t shut the door to anything, but I’m not opening any doors either.”

Still, “I think I got a lot of people involved in the process that had not been involved before and would not have been otherwise,” he said. “A lot of people got out and worked really hard, got motivated to talk to friends and neighbors. I think a lot of people became involved through this campaign that are going to be involved for a long time.”

Girdler stressed his “positive message” and said that Rogers is a “mentor and good friend” that he would turn to for advice in dealing with a frequently combative legislative body in Frankfort, one for which Girdler hopes to help change the culture.

Girdler said that he was “confident and optimistic” during the day Tuesday because he’d “worked extremely hard.” Nevertheless, the realization that he’d won gave him “chill bumps,” he said.

“I’m absolutely honored,” said Girdler. “The position of state senator is more than an honor, more than an office. It’s a charge to keep, and I will give it my all.

“I pledge to be the people’s state senator,” he added. “I look forward to working with everyone to move this region forward.”

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$7.3 million expansion announced by LCRH

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