Posted on 05/13/2019 3:12:48 PM PDT by spintreebob
At Community First Medical Center on the Northwest Side the other day, an intercom repeated, "Code diversion, cath lab." Dr. David Fishman, a cardiologist, paused and said, "That's a bad sign."
The hospital's cardiac imaging equipment was down again, meaning ambulances with heart patients would have to divert to another hospital. At best, that would be nearly 5 miles away.
The outage didn't last long—just long enough to illuminate the challenges of Medicaid-dependent hospitals such as Community First, where less than 1 in 10 inpatients have private insurance and ambulance volume is the city's fifth-highest. It echoes the situation in Melrose Park, where Westlake Hospital is threatened with closure by a new, for-profit owner. Community First also is a rare for-profit hospital.
"You're going to see more and more Westlakes of the world," says Dr. Joseph D'Silva, an orthopedist and chief of surgery at Community First.
'THE ONLY GAME IN TOWN' Five years ago, Chicago lawyer Edward Green and a 50-50 financial partner paid $30 million for the former Our Lady of the Resurrection at Addison Street and Central Avenue—$10 million down and a promised $20 million upgrade over five years—in the Portage Park neighborhood dotted with bungalows and two-flats and where a barbershop offers $8-and-up haircuts.
A Foley & Lardner partner specializing in health care transactions, Green has narrowed operating losses and steadied revenue ($613 million in 2017). He says 2018's results are "a little bit better" than the previous year's $745,800 operating loss and compared with 2014's $12.3 million deficit. Virtually all of the improvement has been achieved by lowering discounts for service, filings show.The hospital's location and safety-net status is, in a way, its salvation. "I think the hospital is viable because it's the only game in town," says Dr. Vishnu Chundi, chair of the department of medicine. Otherwise, "it's going to be like the West Side of Chicago without grocery stores."
Fishman, a physician for 41 years, paints a harrowing picture of an institution having to suspend operating-room shifts, borrow temporary pacemakers from another hospital and cobble together other supplies. Health and dental insurance for employees lapsed for a while because of unpaid premiums, he says. Carpets are worn; a dank parking garage is potholed.
Green, 52, says Community First's situation isn't unusual.
"It is very tough to be a hospital in Illinois," Green says, noting backlogs in state payments and a shift to Medicaid managed care. Denial of payments to Community First runs 30 to 40 percent, he says. He's counting on Gov. J.B. Pritzker and a Democratic Legislature to free up more state funding. But for now, it's only a wish.
Really?
A few years ago I had to take my wife to ER in the middle of the night for uncontrolled bleeding. We have great insurance and as such I was not concerned. I pay a great amount for my insurance.
In the ER waiting room was mostly minorities and illegal aliens. I knew they were illegals by their accents. I speak Spanish and my wife is from Mexico the legal way. She was educated in our universities with multiple degrees in math and computer engineering.
I suspect we were the only person in that waiting room with insurance. It should also be noted when anyone shows up in the emergency room they must be treated. That is the law. They are treated at a great loss to the hospital.
That hospital is now closed due to finances. I do not know the particulars of that hospitals finances. I do know that free treatment contributed to their financial failure.
Single payer medicine: when you want all medical care to be run as well as the Veteran’s Administration runs things.
Oh, except for our elites, of course.
But then again, we’ve got guillotines planned for them.
After they eat some cake.
In a sense all hospitals are government hospitals because if you accept Medicare and Medicaid you fall under their regulations. And even if there exists a hospital that doesn't accept those two, the state hospital regulators are so used to the Medicare and Medicaid regulations that you are practically under them anyway.
I'm guessing but I think what he means is that when your patient base is primarily Medicaid, your primary customer is the state government. Those patients can't afford to pay anything that Medicaid doesn't. And Medicaid has much stricter limits on what it will pay than Medicare does. Medicaid is administered by the State. So you are at the state government's mercy with Medicaid patients.
And if most of your patients are Medicaid, you're operating on a thread and a prayer.
That's one of the problems with government mandating emergency care for indigents but not paying for that care.
A provider has to provide emergency care whether the patient has exceeded Medicaid's limits or not.
I really think government mandating free care but not paying for it is an unconstitutional taking.
I'm fine with government mandating the care, but government should be on the hook to pay if the patient can't.
And that requirement hits hospitals in the poorest areas harder than other hospitals.
Just like Cuba, Medicade for all...except the party members.
bkmk
You were the only people in the room paying a dime. I also bet 8 out of 10 of them were there for non life threatening reasons.
It points out an unavoidable fact of life: there is a limit to how many underclass people a society can carry, and when that limit is exceeded, then collapse is inevitable.
We need to cut back on welfare, to the point where welfare women stop having kids, and stop the Third World invasion.
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