TWO MEMBERS SPLIT ON CATH LAB

The two Southeast Missouri members on the state's Health Facilities Review Committee split their votes over whether to allow St. Francis Medical Center to expand its cardiac catherization laboratory.

Committee member and State Sen. Peter Kinder of Cape Girardeau voted with the majority Wednesday to grant the expansion project. Jackie Herndon of Sikeston was one of the two committee members to vote against the lab expansion.

Kinder had proposed that the committee allow St. Francis to add the lab without restrictions. The committee, however, did add several restrictions.

"I'm comfortable with the decision," Kinder said, adding that testimony from cardiologists indicated the need for two labs at St. Francis, particularly in emergencies.

Kinder said the fact Southeast Missouri Hospital didn't oppose St. Francis' request was key to the committee's decision.

In July, the state committee had approved plans for a fifth cardiac catherization lab in Joplin, a city with two hospitals and about the same size as Cape Girardeau.

Kinder said he would prefer the health review committee be abolished and that such issues be settled in the marketplace.

"I do not think that turning this over to politicians is a good process," he said.

John Fidler, president of St. Francis Medical Center, linked Herndon's opposition of new lab to her employer, Noranda Aluminum in New Madrid County, and its membership in the Southeast Missouri Business Group on Health.

The business group opposed expanding the hospital's lab.

Mary Dunn, executive director of the business group, dismissed Fidler's criticism as did Herndon.

Dunn said Kinder's company, the Southeast Missourian, is also a member of the business group.

Herndon said her decision wasn't based on her company's affiliation with the business group but strictly on the basis of state health statistics.

She said the figures don't justify a need for a fourth cardiac catherization lab in Cape Girardeau.

She also questioned how the conditions set down by the committee would be enforced, saying it would appear the enforcement will be left to the hospital.

Fidler, however, said the hospital's lab project shouldn't have drawn opposition, but that the opposition came because of the business group's desire to force a merger of the two Cape Girardeau hospitals.

But Dunn said the business group's stand on the lab project wasn't tied to the merger issue.

"We don't even know if they can merge," she said. "We just say, `let's explore merger as an option.'"

Fidler, however, said merger isn't possible here because of federal antitrust laws.

Still, he said, both hospitals are interested in working together to eliminate unnecessary duplication of services.