Decisions have been made on two competing proposals for hospitals in North Suffolk, but the approval process is far from over.

Staff of the Division of Certificate of Public Need for the Virginia Health Department recently recommended that the State Health Commissioner approve Bon Secours’ application to add inpatient care in North Suffolk, while Sentara Healthcare’s application for its own project in the vicinity was recommended for denial.

Erik Bodin, director of the Virginia COPN program, confirmed the news Monday. The decisions come after both applications were discussed at a hearing on Sept. 27. Both parties were notified on Friday.

“Naturally, we are very encouraged by this recommendation,” Paul Gaden, chief executive officer for Bon Secours Maryview Medical Center and Bon Secours DePaul Medical Center, stated in a Monday press release.

The Virginia COPN program requires owners and sponsors of medical care facility projects to secure a COPN from the State Health Commissioner prior to initiating projects, such as those that have been proposed by Bon Secours and Sentara.

The two applications are “in competition” based on the program’s rules, because they are in the same vicinity and propose similar services.

Bon Secours filed its COPN application in July to establish a hospital on the Bon Secours Health Center at Harbour View campus.

The application proposes transferring 18 acute-care beds and four operating rooms from Bon Secours Maryview Medical Center in Portsmouth to a two-story, approximately 76,000 square-foot facility in North Suffolk, at the corner of Bon Secours Drive and Harbour Towne Parkway.

The new hospital will be a surgically-focused facility geared towards patients in need of specialized surgeries but not expected to require extended inpatient stays.

“Bon Secours believes that our innovative proposal to build a short-stay, surgically-focused hospital on the Bon Secours Harbour View campus is what is best for our community,” Gaden stated.

The Sentara proposal is for an in-patient acute care hospital with 24 acute care beds, two general purpose operating rooms and one CT scanner at the Sentara BelleHarbour Campus on Bridge Road. According to Bodin, staff only recommended the proposed addition of a CT scanner.

“We are disappointed in the recommendation, and we are considering the next steps in the COPN process,” stated Dr. Steve Julian, president of Sentara Obici Hospital and its subsidiaries, Sentara BelleHarbour and Sentara St. Luke’s in Isle of Wight County.

According to Julian, the Sentara application “offers the most benefit for the least cost in a hospital-ready building already under construction.” The Sentara project was estimated to be $32 million at the Sept. 27 hearing, less than half of the $77 estimation for the Bon Secours proposal.

In COPN cases such as this, if either or both projects are denied or there is a petition from a third party, an administrative judge will weigh in at an informal fact-finding conference. This conference is expected to be held in Richmond sometime in November, according to Bodin.

Bon Secours spokesperson Lynne Zultanky said the recommendation is just the first step in the process for final approval from the Health Commissioner. That decision is expected to be made at the end of 2018 or early 2019, depending on whether or not the fact-finding conference occurs.