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University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Expands Its Reach in Qatar

Posted on: Monday, 12 June 2006, 21:00 CDT

By Christopher Snowbeck, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Jun. 13--The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center will collect $100 million over 4 1/2 years to provide education, training and some hands-on services to the emergency medical system in Qatar, a Middle Eastern nation on the Persian Gulf.

The deal, announced yesterday, expands the roster of foreign countries where UPMC provides health-care services beyond its specialty hospital in Palermo, Italy, and radiation oncology programs in Ireland that are scheduled to open this year.

Emergency medicine experts from UPMC have consulted in Qatar for about three years, but yesterday's announcement expands the relationship, said Chuck Bogosta, executive vice president for strategic business initiatives and cancer services. The new effort will help Qatar improve emergency medical care in eight areas, including quality of care and use of electronic medical records.

UPMC has hired a full-time project manager based in Qatar and will rotate doctors and nurses from Pittsburgh to the Hamad Medical Corporation, which operates hospitals and the emergency medical system in Qatar. In total, about 13 employees will staff the program, including a mix of UPMC and international employees.

"We've developed outstanding technology and capabilities in these areas, and it's an opportunity for us -- to bring funds back to Western Pennsylvania to invest in our mission," Mr. Bogosta said.

With a population of about 900,000 and a geographic footprint similar in size to Western Pennsylvania, Qatar has turned previously to the United States and even the Pittsburgh area for help developing high-end services.

During 2004, Carnegie Mellon University opened a branch in the country's Education City development, which serves students from kindergarten through postgraduate studies. The CMU agreement followed similar deals by other elite American institutions with the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development, which has ties to the nation's ruler.

The Qatar Foundation, for example, committed $750 million toward Cornell University's establishment of a medical college in Education City.

Mr. Bogosta said Hamad Medical Corporation is overseen by the Qatar Foundation, but added that UPMC's emergency medicine collaboration is unrelated to Cornell's medical school plans.

Qatar approached UPMC three years ago to initiate the consulting relationship, Mr. Bogosta said, because officials in the Middle Eastern nation recognized UPMC's success with emergency medicine. The parties have worked together to develop training standards for Qatar's emergency medical service that match those in the United States.

Qatar officials also were aware of UPMC's experience with the specialty hospital in Italy, he added.

Under an agreement that runs through 2012, the Sicilian government is paying up to $90 million for the hospital's annual operating costs, and UMPC receives an annual management fee of $9.7 million, reduced by $300,000 each year. In Ireland, UPMC is providing $2.5 million in capital for two cancer center projects where it will have 50-50 joint ventures with local hospitals.

The health system also is in talks with the public health service in England about developing ambulatory care services in the United Kingdom, Mr. Bogosta said, but any deal in Britain would be "a couple years away."

UPMC's success in securing a deal in the Middle East stands in contract to its desert efforts closer to home. A spokeswoman yesterday said the prospect of UPMC operating a new hospital in Las Vegas -- an idea first floated more than a year ago -- remains on the back burner.

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Copyright (c) 2006, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

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Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

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