Click here for an interactive look at the UNMC proposal.
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The University of Nebraska Medical Center and its hospital partner propose the largest building project ever on the campus, a $370 million initiative devoted mainly to cancer research and treatment.
The project is the main component of an NU legislative proposal that includes a $17 million nursing facility in Lincoln, a $19 million health care training facility at the University of Nebraska at Kearney and $5 million to plan and design a veterinary diagnostic center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
The proposals, which would require a total of $91 million from the state's cash reserve fund, will compete with Gov. Dave Heineman's plan for tax cuts, State Sen. Tony Fulton of Lincoln said Wednesday. Fulton agreed to introduce legislation for the College of Nursing facility in Lincoln.
“Anything with a dollar sign on it mathematically is in competition with the tax cut proposals,” Fulton said.
UNMC Chancellor Harold Maurer said the Omaha project would require a year to 18 months of additional planning with construction concluding four years from now.
The money would include $50 million from the state, $200 million from private sources and $120 million in debt that the hospital would incur. Hospital revenues would pay off the debt, most likely over 20 years, Nebraska Medical Center President Glenn Fosdick said.
A huge cancer complex would add to a massive building boom that has taken place at UNMC over the past decade or more. The growth has included two research towers, a medical education building, a center for nursing, a geriatric center and other facilities.
The complex would go up between the Durham Outpatient Center and the two Durham research towers. Swanson Hall and the Durham Outpatient Center parking garage would be razed and an underground parking garage would replace the lost parking spots.
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The cancer complex would include a $110 million cancer research tower; a $63 million, 108-bed inpatient cancer center; and a $150 million outpatient cancer center. The construction project also would include a $47 million ambulatory care, or non-emergency, center at 42nd and Farnam Streets. The fourth building wouldn't be cancer-related.
Maurer said the cancer complex would bolster the medical center's standing in American medicine. “It will allow us to attract outstanding physicians and scientists, and students and graduate students of all kinds as well,” he said.
Fosdick said the institution already has a good reputation among cancer experts. People came to the campus last year from all 50 states and 42 countries for cancer care, Fosdick said.
He said the National Cancer Institute controls federal funding for cancer research.
The med center is designated as an NCI “clinical cancer center” but not as one of the 40 more prestigious “comprehensive cancer centers.” The proposed complex and its huge research component should enable the med center to attain the more prestigious designation, the administrators said.
“With this project, we become more of a nationally recognized cancer campus,” Maurer said.
Maurer said cancer care generates about half the revenue at the hospital and about half the research grant support at UNMC. He also said the complex would generate 1,200 jobs for physicians, researchers and other staffers.
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Dr. Kenneth Cowan, director of UNMC's Eppley Cancer Center, said the complex would enable cancer researchers and cancer physicians to work more closely with each other. The outpatient clinic would place under one roof cancer specialists, radiation experts, nurses, pharmacists, dietitians and physical therapists who see cancer patients, Cowan said.
Consequently, patients wouldn't have to shuttle around the campus in order to get different parts of their cancer care, Cowan said.
Although the governor has been briefed on NU's proposals, they weren't included in his state budget. NU President J.B. Milliken said he didn't know if Heineman would support the package.
Milliken said the university would be remiss if it didn't propose strategies to address state needs such as job creation and health care services. “We have an obligation to make the case,” he said.
Fosdick said Oklahoma, Kansas and other states are expanding their cancer care facilities. To stay competitive, he said, UNMC and the hospital must expand theirs.
The question isn't why they would do it, Fosdick said.
“The issue is, why wouldn't we do it?”
Contact the writer:
402-444-1123, rick.ruggles@owh.com
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