Setback for New Hospital

Judge Orders Health Commissioner to Revisit Applications

A Circuit Court judge withdrew permission last week for a national hospital chain to build Loudoun County's second hospital but left open the possibility of it being reapproved.

Loudoun Healthcare Inc., which runs the nonprofit Loudoun Hospital Center, had asked Judge Theodore J. Markow of Richmond Circuit Court to revoke the approval of HCA Corp.'s plan to build the 164-bed Broadlands Regional Medical Center in eastern Loudoun.

Markow ordered Virginia Health Commissioner Robert B. Stroube to reopen the administrative record on the Broadlands application and two others -- requests by Loudoun Hospital and Inova Fair Oaks Hospital for additional beds -- that were dependent on it.

Markow said that Stroube, in making his decision, failed to disclose relevant correspondence about the case to competing applicants such as Loudoun Healthcare. Specifically, Markow cited the nondisclosure of e-mail from James Reinhard, commissioner of the Virginia Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse Services, suggesting that Gov. Mark R. Warner (D) supported the Broadlands application.

A hearing must be held on the three applications within 60 days, and Stroube must reconsider them within three months, Markow ruled.

"We're confident the commissioner will move swiftly on the remand and will once again come to the same conclusion that he did before when issuing the COPN [certificate of public need] to Broadlands Regional Medical Center," Bryan K. Dearing, chief executive officer of the planned hospital, said in a news release.

Loudoun Hospital wants to add 33 beds at its Cornwall campus in Leesburg, and Inova Fair Oaks wants to add 22 beds at its hospital in western Fairfax County.

"Taken together, these . . . actions by Judge Markow hold great promise for the citizens of Loudoun County that perhaps Commissioner Stroube will arrive at a set of decisions that truly improve access to health care for everyone in Loudoun County," said Rod Huebbers, president and chief executive of Loudoun Hospital. "Everyone can rest assured that we will be fighting tooth and nail for more beds at our Cornwall campus."

The ruling is the latest development in a battle over the future of health care in the nation's fastest-growing county, where local officials say health care services have not kept up with population growth.

Loudoun Healthcare contends that the Broadlands project -- to be built just five miles from its Lansdowne campus -- would cause competition that would drive up health care costs. HCA says the county can support two hospitals.