Children's hospitals team to provide cardiac care

In a unique interstate agreement, the Bristol-Myers Squibb Children's Hospital at Robert Wood John University Hospital in New Brunswick, N.J., and the Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital of New York-Presbyterian Hospital have formed a joint venture to bring a pediatric cardiac surgery program to the New Jersey hospital. Under the five-year contract, New York-Presbyterian will supply the surgeons and training, allowing the New York program to expand into New Jersey. Robert Wood Johnson has budgeted $3 million to cover the cost of the program in the first year and will reimburse the New York surgeons on a fee-for-service basis, officials said. The venture, which includes the medical schools associated with each hospital, will bring New Jersey its third such program. Once fully established, the program will offer services ranging from cardiac diagnostic studies to interventional procedures such as open-heart surgery. Meanwhile, a new pediatric catheterization lab is under construction in New Brunswick as part of an expansion of the children's hospital. -- by Cinda Becker