The Arizona Republic, Jahna Berry, Biomedical Breakdown:
Banner Health and the University of Arizona may have hit a rough spot.
For months, the pair have tried to hammer out a plan that would bring a hospital to the Phoenix Biomedical Campus downtown. They missed a self-imposed summer deadline.
The teaching hospital is a critical component in plans to grow Phoenix's 28-acre biomedical campus.
Phoenix and the U of A want a large teaching hospital, larger than the 200 beds that Banner wants to build.
If the U of A was thinking of taking the hospital proposal to Banner's old competitor, Maricopa Integrated Health System, Maricopa CEO Betsy Bayless hints to the Arizona Republic that may not be an option:
"The county hospital system still plans to build a new acute-care hospital with 400 to 450 beds. The system has embarked on a six- to nine-month plan that seeks to answer important questions, including financing and location, for a new hospital.
'We were talking about going to downtown Phoenix. That is not necessarily our plan right now,' Bayless said.
So what happens next? Stay tuned.
