April 28, 2009

Alberta heart hospital changes boost cost by $60 million

EDMONTON

Controversy over the long-delayed opening of Alberta’s flagship Mazankowski Heart Institute took a bizarre twist April 23, with Alberta’s health minister promising that patients will be allowed in next month, but administrators saying they won’t.

“The CEO had given me information that they expected to start taking patients in May,” Health Minister Ron Liepert told the legislature.

But the spokesman for Alberta’s health superboard, which oversees work on the $217-million futuristic flagship facility, said the facility will not be opening next month.

“There’s not a couple of different stories here,” said Rob Stevenson of Alberta Health Services. “It’s not going to open until late summer, early fall.

The disconnect was the latest twist in a facility that was officially opened by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach on May 1, 2008. The event made coast-to-coast headlines.

The centre — named for former deputy prime minister, and heart attack survivor, Don Mazankowski — was trumpeted as a state-of-the art facility expected to draw heart specialists from around the world and rival Montreal’s Heart Institute.

But the doors, once opened, immediately closed as contractors and administrators worked to implement well over a thousand design changes to, among other things, accommodate a redesigned cardiac catheterization lab and a revised intensive care unit.

The changes led to the opening being pushed back from May 2008 to last November, and then finally to this September.

When pushed in the legislature by Liberal critic Kevin Taft on reports the centre may be delayed again into 2010, Liepert announced the Mazankowski would be taking patients in May.

Taft said the confusion is telling.

“This is a sign of this government’s incompetence when it comes to health care. The Mazankowski construction was announced six years ago this month.” he said.

Meanwhile, the 62,000-square-metre, 132-bed structure stands ready, towering over the south end of the University of Alberta campus, highlighted by a 16-storey signature curved wall of south-facing glass.

The building, paid for in part by $45 million in private donations, will house high-tech gadgets and state-of the art treatment facilities, including a three-dimensional lab, where surgeons will be able to examine computer-generated, three-dimensional images of the hearts they will be working on.

The changes and delays have boosted the price tag by $60 million and have reportedly led to staff turnover and questions whether some of the specialists recruited to work there will indeed still come.

Stevenson said no specialists have changed their minds.

There were also indications the delay remains a politically sensitive issue.

Responding to questions, Liepert distanced the government from the process.

“It was not the government of Alberta that had the official opening. It was the former Capital Health Region,” he told the house April 15.

He also suggested the construction setbacks can’t be put at his door, either.

“This government is not managing the construction of the Mazankowski Heart Institute. It started out under the Capital Health Region and is currently being managed by Alberta Health Services,” he said.

Canadian Press

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