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Who uses COPN Atlas, and for what

The examples below use the Virginia file, and the Maryland, North Carolina and DC files work the same way. Here is what it does for each kind of team that works on certificate of public need matters.

Law firms and health regulatory counsel CON and health planning consultants Hospital strategy and planning teams Imaging, surgery, cardiology and post-acute operators Investors, lenders and healthcare real estate

Law firms and health regulatory counsel

The job: Advise a hospital, practice or developer client whether to file, oppose a competing request or contest a decision, and back the advice with Virginia precedent.
How it works today: Decisions are posted by certificate number and staff reports separately, so a precedent set means opening PDFs one at a time.

What the file gives you

Every decision since 2016 beside the DCOPN staff recommendation. When staff recommended denial, the Commissioner approved about 7 in 10 of those requests anyway.
The State Medical Facilities Plan sections staff found not met, with their reasons, from recent staff reports, and the Commissioner's reason wherever the decision departs from staff.
The five closest decided precedents for each pending request and letter of intent, same service line and planning district first.
A calendar of filing deadlines, review cycles and expected decision dates, as a tab and as a calendar file.

For law firms

CON and health planning consultants

The job: Build an application that holds up in staff review: the existing inventory, the comparable projects and the cost benchmarks.
How it works today: Inventory and utilization tables sit inside old staff reports, and pulling comparable projects is a records search every time.

What the file gives you

Existing equipment and beds by planning district from 85+ DCOPN staff reports, with the data year and the source report on each facility row.
Every request since 2016, to filter by service line, district and capital cost. The median request took about five months from application to decision.
The need calculations DCOPN printed in recent staff reports, by planning district and service, next to the State Medical Facilities Plan threshold each one tests.
Why staff recommended denial, section by section, so a new application can answer those findings before staff raise them.

For consultants

Hospital strategy and planning teams

The job: Know what competitors are planning in your service area before it reaches public notice, and brief leadership on it.
How it works today: Letters of intent, notices and decisions post on separate VDH pages, and spotting a competitor's filing means checking each one by hand.

What the file gives you

Letters of intent with no public notice yet, each matched to the health system behind it.
Scorecards for 30+ health systems, plus independent applicants: requests, approval rate, capital requested, staff denials and what is pending.
A monthly list of what changed, filtered to the districts, services or competitors you choose.

For planning teams

Imaging, surgery, cardiology and post-acute operators

The job: Decide where to add a scanner, a cath lab, operating rooms or beds, and judge the odds and the timeline before spending on an application.
How it works today: Approval rates and review times by service and district have to be pieced together from individual decisions.

What the file gives you

Approval rate, staff overrides and time to decision by service line and planning district, for CT, MRI, PET, cardiac cath and every other service.
Who already operates units in the district and how busy they are, from the inventory tables in staff reports.
The requests pending now and the letters of intent already filed, so you know who you would be competing with in the next batch.

For operators

Investors, lenders and healthcare real estate

The job: Diligence a provider, a deal or a site whose value depends on a certificate of public need.
How it works today: Confirming what a certificate covers, its conditions and whether it is still within its validity period usually takes a records request.

What the file gives you

Certificate number, scope and conditions for each approval, including any charity care condition.
Validity periods for 480+ certificates, with completion, extension or surrender wherever a later VDH document reports it.
Capital cost from the public notice and the parent health system on every row.

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