At Union Memorial Hospital in Baltimore, the medical director has pored over patient records to determine which antibiotics are to blame for a potentially fatal infection. In Ohio, physicians at Akron General Medical Center are experimenting with rats to determine whether a popular painkiller also slows the spread of cancerous cells. And in Los Angeles, doctors at Cedars Sinai Medical Center are teaching computers to interpret heart scans.
Across the country, tighter finances and tougher competition are prompting many community hospitals to move beyond their core business of administering tests and performing surgery. Increasingly, they are doing cutting-edge research that had been left to universities, drug companies and government laboratories.
"The classic paradigm of research is expanding," said Barbara V. Howard, president of the research arm of MedStar Health, a network of seven area hospitals that includes Union Memorial. "Hospitals like ours are taking an increasing role."
FOR THE RECORD - A Page 1A article yesterday about the expansion of research at community hospitals incorrectly reported the location of the Baylor Health Care System. It is in Dallas, Texas.
The Sun regrets the errors.
In addition to treating patients, community hospitals are studying experimental drugs, developing medical devices and investigating serious diseases.
They are also recruiting scientists, building laboratories and competing for prestigious research grants. Some are publishing papers in peer-reviewed journals and obtaining patents.
"It just enriches your ability to do high-quality medical care," said Margot LaPointe, medical director of research at Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, which has 71 scientists and a $56 million research budget for studying the treatment of prostate cancer with gene therapy, among other projects.
The work can also bolster a hospital's profits. At a time of heightened competition from other medical centers, research breakthroughs burnish a hospital's reputation, helping it attract physicians and patients. It also provides new sources of income to offset rising labor costs and lower Medicare payments.
Companies pay
Community medical centers are conducting some of the research on behalf of pharmaceutical companies, which pay for patients to participate in clinical trials testing new drugs and medical devices. As that work increases, ethicists and watchdogs worry about the possibility of conflicts of interest.
"If you think of it as philanthropy, it is not," said Frank Sloan, a professor of health economics at Duke University. "Some of it is public relations, and there's some money."
