Valley Medical Center will appeal a state decision that prevents it from adding 30 acute-care patient beds in its new Emergency Department tower.

The appeal comes after the state Department of Health granted on Dec. 21 a request by MultiCare Health Systems to build a 58-bed hospital in Covington.

In doing so, the state turned down Valley Medical’s request for 60 new patient beds at the hospital and Auburn Regional Medical Center’s application for 70 beds there.

Valley Medical’s 60-bed request also includes 30 beds in vacant space within the hospital.

In a press release, the state Department of Health indicated there is a need for additional hospital beds in Southeast King County. However, “the projected bed need for Southeast King County communities doesn’t support approval of more than one of these projects.”

MultiCare would build its new hospital at its Covington Medical Park in downtown Covington.

The state health department’s decision has no impact on Valley Medical Center’s plan to break ground on a new Emergency Department (emergency room) in Covington early next year.

Rich Roodman, Valley Medical’s CEO, said in a press release announcing the appeal that residents of Covington and Maple Valley do need more access to emergency services, which is why the hospital expanded its Urgent Care clinic and will break ground on the new Emergency Department.

Roodman sees a better use for the beds the state just gave to MultiCare for a new hospital.

“With full service inpatient care only minutes away at VMC, we feel that it is a bigger benefit to the region to expand the number of beds at our facility, which is equipped with a Level III Trauma Center and comprehensive specialty services,” he said in the press release.

MultiCare also will build a 24-hour Emergency Department, this one at its Covington Urgent Care site, starting in the first quarter of 2011. It plans to open the facility about a year later.

Hugh Kodama, administrator for the MultiCare Covington Clinic, told the Covington Reporter newspaper that the state’s decision “is a big community win.

“Southeast King County is being recognized as a regional entity. This is exciting. More and more services will now be brought out here,” he told the Covington Reporter.

The original plan was to open MultiCare’s hospital in 2014 or 2015, but the timeline will be reassessed now that the certificate of need request has been completed, Kodama told the Covington Reporter.

The state health department’s CoN program, or certificate of need program, approves requests for certain new hospital facilities or new or expanded services.

Valley Medical wasn’t required to undergo such a review for its new Emergency Department in Covington because the facility has no in-patient beds, said hospital spokeswoman Kim Blakeley. Like any ER, it will have treatment rooms.

Valley Medical Center also wasn’t required to obtain a certificate of need for the Emergency Department on the hospital’s Renton campus because it has no in-patient beds. However, the long-term vision has always been to add patient beds to the sixth floor of the seven-story South Tower.

Fulfilling that vision “will take us awhile longer,” Blakeley said.

The phased expansion of the 60 beds would cost about $20 million, according to Valley Medical’s request to the state. The original plan called for having the beds in the South Tower in use in 2014.

Moving the Emergency Department and the hospital’s joint and spine center to the South Tower opened up space elsewhere in the hospital, thus the request for an additional 30 beds. Valley Medical now has 330 patient beds.

Blakeley said the appeal has yet to be filed with the state.

“We feel that eventually we will get our beds,” she said.