Sutter to close Santa Rosa hospital

The Sutter Medical Center will close its Chanate Road campus early next year, but Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital will buy some of Sutter’s assets and keep them going, said a statement issued jointly on Monday by the two hospitals.
“The Chanate campus, which (Sutter) leases from Sonoma County, does not meet new state seismic regulations and needs to close by 2015,” the statement said. “(Sutter) would return the Chanate buildings and land to the County.”
Sutter has put on hold its plans to replace the seismically unsafe facility by building a new hospital on 25 acres near the Wells Fargo Center for the Arts on Highway 101 because of “skyrocketing hospital construction costs,” the statement said.
Memorial Hospital has signed a letter of intent to buy certain assets of Sutter’s operations, including Sutter’s Warrack Hospital, which is used for outpatient care.
Meanwhile, the Sonoma Valley Hospital needs to retrofit or replace its existing Andrieux Street hospital under the same seismic standards that will close the Sutter’s Chanate Road hospital.