St. Theresa Long-Term Acute Care Facility in Kenner, La., says it will offer state-of-the art equipment.

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Louisiana’s Liljeberg Enterprises LLC got its start in the retail/pharmacy business in 1972 and eventually moved into real estate development. Today, the company is combining its expertise in the medical and development fields for the St. Theresa Long-Term Acute Care (LTAC) Facility in Kenner, La.

The one-story, 100,000-square-foot facility will feature a limestone front with large columns, chandeliers, granite, cherry and walnut finishes and private patient rooms with private bathrooms. “The whole idea is that since patients will be there for longer than a normal hospital stay, to offer comforts and amenities,” Nurse Manager Theresa Reynolds says. “We want to offer more TLC than is expected and bring that back to the bedside.”

She says the hospital also wants to offer doctors state-of-the-art equipment, giving those who have left the region a reason to come back and maintaining new doctors there.

The project is Phase I of a two-phase medical complex. The acute care center is designed for patients who need functional restoration and rehabilitation, and medical management, for an average of five to six weeks.

St. Theresa says the acute care facility will include 42 beds and will use an interdisciplinary approach toward treatment.

The center will offer a sleep lab, a gym for rehabilitation with occupational and physical therapy, speech therapy facilities and a wound-management program. Reynolds says the average length of stay will be 25 days. Some of its patients will require medically complex or debilitating-condition management.

It will also be equipped to provide special services to patients who are technology dependent.

The hospital says its mission is to “provide quality healthcare service in a comprehensive and cost-competitive manner, providing the finest and safest accommodations in the region.”

It will treat such conditions as pulmonary problems, ventilator dependency and neurological disorders such as strokes or Parkinson’s disease, and multi-symptom challenges such as diabetes, cardiac disease, post-operative complications, spinal cord injuries, burn patients and serious wound management.

The facility’s specialized programs will include restorative care, physical and occupational therapy. As reported by The Times-Picayune, the two-phase project is worth $60 million.

Phase I is scheduled to open in August 2008, and Phase II is expected to open one year later. Phase II will include an imaging center, procedure rooms, four operating rooms for ambulatory surgeries and an additional 31 beds, as well as 10 rehab beds for orthopedic surgeries.
    
Honesty and Fairness
Liljeberg Enterprises says it prides itself on honesty, fairness and being able tto succeed despite many hardships.

Reynolds says these hardships have included lawsuits in federal courts that the company considers “harassing” and brought about in an effort to ruin its good name.

Hurricane Katrina brought with it a slew of additional hardships. Since the hurricane hit, the St. Theresa project has been delayed by a year-and-a-half.

“After Katrina, the work force was wiped out completely,” Reynolds says. “It’s hard to find skilled laborers and engineers.”

The hurricane also drastically increased the need for a new hospital project.

“Prior to the storm, there were 11 [acute care facilities] in the area; now, there are only four,” Reynolds says. “Some of the major hospitals in the city still have not come back and the hospitals are overloaded, so we’re trying to fill that void for acute patients.”