Travis County Commissioners Court
Tuesday, August 16, 2011 (Agenda)
Item 4
4, consider and take appropriate action on resolution in support of a network of central Texas medical institutions and organizations to form a research center in the Austin region and joining the neurological emergencies treatment trials.
good morning.
>> good morning, judge, Commissioners, sherri fleming, health and human services and veterans services.
we have our partners from seton and I'll introduce or reacquaint many of you with ash ton kumberbatch and have him discuss this important resolution today.
>> good morning, Commissioners.
thanks for having me.
let me introduce my guests.
to my far right paul hensley, medical director Austin-Travis County emergency medical services.
and then to his left we have benjamin king who I believe you have met previously, project manager for hospitals and clinical research and dell children's medical center emergency departments.
and then to my immediate right we have dr. John bedova who is the emergency medicine physician and assistant medical director of hospital physicians and clinical research.
and also chief of staff at seton medical center northwest.
we're here before you this morning to talk about a unique opportunity that central Texas has to participate as a hub in the national institute of neurological stroke or rather the net network as a hub.
the the network is trials, Travis County has participated as a spoke for the past couple of years.
but we have an opportunity now by invitation to participate as a hub.
and I'm going to let the doctor talk in more detail about what that means and the benefits to our region if we were to do that.
>> thank you very much.
thank you very much for allowing us to come here today and speak to you.
this provides a variety of benefits to the community.
it provides increased funding and will support a number of -- of good jobs in the community.
being a net hub means that we get money directly from the nih national insults of health to support research and it provides a tremendous amount of prestige to the community in terms of becoming a research facility for biomedical research, and it brings together a whole variety of institutions in town and unifies them and gets them working together which will help create a critical mass of research in Austin.
particularly the area of neurologic emergencies is a leading area.
right now in neurology treatment we're kind of where we were with heart conditions in the 1980s where we're starting to develop a whole lot of treatment modalities to allows you to treat stokes and emergencies and get good outcomes.
the other good thing it will do is that in addition to benefiting the city of Austin in terms of prestige benefiting in terms of jobs, benefiting in terms of the research, it brings cutting-edge care to the poor and vulnerable to the city of Austin.
so we are asking for you to consider a letter of support for our application that -- and research doesn't exist in a vacuum, it exists in a community, and the model for this is cities like dallas that provide a tremendous amount of community support to hospitals such as research institutions such as parkland memorial hospital.
so at basically this doesn't -- this is no -- there's no need for any kind of revenue from the city -- from the Travis County and it will provide a variety of benefits.
>> what's the importance of support by Travis County?
>> well, thank you.
that's a very good question.
the sort of top tier research such as this, what they want to see at the nih is because research doesn't do well in a vacuum, that the whole community backs it.
for example, y'all have supported us before with the rampart in which we enrolled -- we were the fourth highest enroller in the country.
so the benefit of having a letter from y'all is it really increases our chances of becoming a hub versus a spoke.
the different right now is houston is the hub and we are the spoke, but we have been enroll ago lot more patients in all these trials in houston so we believe we would best serve nih by being the hub.
>> okay.
any additional comments?
>> mr. King, do you have any comments?
>> I think in your background --
>> that was eloquent, by the way.
>> [laughter]
>> I just point out the name of the collaborative will be enroll which stands for emergency neurological research collaborative of central Texas.
as the doctor has said we have a variety of partners that are involved in it and I think this would be a great opportunity for us to cease upon here in Travis County so we appreciate your support.
>> do you know possibility if it does become a hub and we end up supporting you and I know we probably will after we vote here, but you remember a little while back, I guess with the four seasons, there was a lot of testimony given about the neurological situation, that the nerve damage that persons have been involved in, and if I recall it was pretty intense and, of course, seton was involved in that.
and it really is to make sure we get something here where we can deal with persons that do have the problems of nerve situations even in the situation where it may become debilitating as far as being paralyzed even.
so I think it's a great opportunity to centralize it and as you stated not being a spoke but being a hub so you could get the necessary funding, a whole lot of things to really enhance it.
after hearing the testimony of some of the folks at that particular event, it really convinced you this is something we should do.
I remember that very well and, of course, I'm willing to move forward and let's see what happens and let's see -- let me ask this question.
when will you get your first response from -- after the letter and all these other kind of -- the local support, resolution and all these things that goes up line, how long will it take before you get some response to what we're doing here today?
>> in early January.
the request for proposal is coming out soon and then we'll submit that as soon as the request for proposal is sent and in early January we'll hear.
>> early January?
>> yes, sir.
>> please keep us posted.
and I know
>> [indiscernible] is a pretty good person for keeping us notified.
>> thank you for your comments.
>> thank you.
>> judge, Commissioners, do you have before you today a draft resolution that staff recommends approval, and that resolution would serve as your support of this initiative.
>> we'll have an original --
>> yes, sir.
>> -- following Travis County style before the end of the day.
>> yes, sir.
>> move approval.
>> second.
>> any more discussion?
doctor?
>> this is a great opportunity for us.
some people don't realize because this is a collaborative effort with the county, we're the 16th largest e.m.s.
system in the country.
because of that collaboration in the past and previous efforts on the rampart trial, as a spoke we've become very attractive but we outperform most of the hubs.
we hopefully have become very attractive for them, means great things for the system and health care and great things for our citizens.
I think it's a great opportunity for us.
>> I think so.
>> all in favor?
that passes by unanimous vote.
>> thank y'all.
>> thank you.
good to see you again.
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
