Cardiac center unveiled

ONLINE: For a video tour of the Norma and Evert Person Heart & Vascular Institute, go to pressdemocrat.comSanta Rosa Memorial Hospital on Wednesday unveiled its nearly complete $57 million cardiac and vascular treatment center, a three-story, high-tech facility.

Hospital officials said the new Norma and Evert Person Heart & Vascular Institute, when it opens in late August, will centralize all of Memorial's cardiac and vascular diagnostic and treatment services, speeding up treatments.

The Persons donated $5 million of the $16.3 million in private donations toward construction of the new heart institute. St. Joseph Health System, which operates Memorial Hospital, provided the rest of the funding.

Evert Person is a former publisher and owner of The Press Democrat.

The new heart center, located just east of Memorial's emergency department, includes two catheterization labs, two cardiac surgery rooms, an electrophysiology lab, a 10-bed observation unit, nine post-operative recovery beds (including one for pediatric patients), facilities for medical staff and a patient lounge and garden.

"From a physician's standpoint, this room is absolutely luxurious in terms of size and quality of equipment," said Dr. John Reed, a prominent Santa Rosa cardiologist, as he stood in the doorway of a catheterization lab.

Reed, who has been instrumental in raising money for the project, said the center will shave 10 minutes off treatment of heart attacks, from "door to balloon" time, a reference to the catheter technique of using a balloon to open clogged arteries.

The original price tag for the complex was $23 million in 2005, but rising construction costs doubled that initial estimate.

Officials said construction of the 27,328 square-foot building, which began in July 2006, will be complete sometime in August.

Public tours of the new heart institute will be held today between 4 and 6 p.m.