here is a pretty good write up about a discussion on the sale of St. Michaels Hospital proposal that occurred last night - came in by e-mail from POP: Hello folks-- Brief takeaways on last nights community forum. Renee, you may be particularly interested in how the plan for Newark hospitals is characterized by Councilmember Chaneyfield. Attendance -- There were chairs for about 150 or so, and at least for the first hour and a half, the place was full. Attendance dwindled dramatically as we approached the two hour mark. However, the room was at least 75% workers at the hospital. The bus from the senior center did arrive, but I was outside from 5:30-6:30 and the overwhelming majority of folks either walked over from the main hospital or showed up with scrubs, ID badges etc. At one point, Peter Adamo from Prime asked for a show of hands of who worked at the hospital. Its not clear what he was trying to prove, but most of the hands that went up. Press -- None whatsoever. There were two photographers, but one was there from the hospital and the other was asked to be there by Councilmember Chaneyfield. Electeds -- Councilmember Chaneyfield was the MC and the main messenger, so Ill include her remarks separately. Councilmember Amador -- Spoke at the beginning. I didnt hear his remarks. Assemblyman Giblin -- Spoke for about 3 minutes, but it was super vague and general about how people have to get active, diversity is good, and layoffs are bad. He barely even mentioned anything relating to the current situation at the hospital and instead gave advice on how to do activism to your elected representatives. Councilmember Ramos -- Spoke for about 2 minutes. The only one besides Chaneyfield to sing Primes praises. The sale has to come through or the hospital will close. Ive seen hospitals close, and its bad. Prime is great, so lets get the sale done. Council President Crump -- Spoke for about 1 minute. She quite artfully threaded the needle. She is against any hospital closing, and shell chain herself to the fence if needs be. But thats all she said -- nothing specific to St. Michaels or the sale. Assemblywoman Eliana Pinto Marin -- Spoke for about 5 minutes. She was pro-sale but said that any buyer, whether Prime or anyone else, has to demonstrate that they care about this community and are committed to it. Her stance seemed to be We need a buyer, any buyer. Messages in support of the sale -- David Ricci did most of the due diligence, outlining the process, what guided the boards decision, and the financial realities that are forcing them to sell. He was very careful to say that Trinity will reach a point where they might (future tense, and hedging) have to walk away. It was mostly everything weve heard from him before, and stood in contrast to Gayles rabble rousing and exaggerations. Gayles remarks -- well, lets just say Ive never heard the Cleveland Clinic bashed so much or Burger King praised so much in a healthcare discussion. Her theme appeared to be that the state is engineering a solution through the Navigational Report that will be awful. The only alternative to the sale to Prime would be for the state to close/take over St. Mikes, Rutgers-University Hospital moves over to that campus for a few years, the current University Hospital is completely redone from the ground up, they move back into the new building, and then they probably close the St. Michaels campus. She says the state will force this solution so we have to force them to approve the sale to Prime instead. She said St. Michaels is already slated for closure (Ricci never backed that up) and people need to wake up and do everything to save their hospital. Finally, she kept coming back to Burger King, that we can have fast food places on every corner, but the state wants to create a monopoly where Newark only has two hospitals. She brought this Burger King comparison and the word monopoly up at least four different times. Fred Ortega, Corporate Director of Government Relations for Prime -- This was mostly Primes by-the-numbers pitch. He claimed Prem Reddy was going to attend himself but was unable to because theyre about to close on a hospital in Alabama. When David Weiner asked our questions, he was the one who answered. He claims St. Marys has come to terms with all insurers except United (anyone know if that is true), that Prime does more charity care per patient than any other hospital in California (true through the fuzzy math way they calculate it, which includes bad debt as well as charity care -- sadly, thats not an uncommon way for hospitals to bump up their charity care numbers), that no wrong doing has yet been found on their Medicare overbilling investigation, he was not conversant on the Medicaid lawsuit in Rhode Island, and that Prime has never said that they wouldnt change the agreement to be 10 years not 5, they just havent done so yet. His oddest comment was that Prime hasnt previously done outreach to the community because theyre not allowed to until the Attorney General has signed off on the sale. Donna Jackson later cornered him on this asking if hes not allowed to talk to the community, is he breaking the law by talking to us now? (I planted that question with Donna after I heard his ridiculous comment). Peter Adamo, Regional CEO, Prime Healthcare -- This guy was a hot mess. He tried to wow the crowd with his Jersey charm and Jersey cred and basically had folks running to the exits. He was nominally supposed to talk about how much better his two hospitals in Pennsylvania were now that Prime owned them, but it got lost in a sea of wacky jokes, football references, and too-clever-by-half salesmanship. His locutions on the differences between for-profit and not-for-profit was spectacularly awful and condescending -- its apparently just that for-profits have access to different capital and have to pay taxes, and HOW WONDERFUL that Prime pays taxes! JNESO -- Both Doug Placa and President Elfrieda Johnson offered comments on how we need to save the hospital, saluting the workers, and how vital St. Mikes is to the community. In a private moment at the end, Doug joked with me that he couldnt get any of the members at the hospital to speak up, so he had to do it. Messages against the sale -- David Weiner, CWA -- I really want to salute David, who when given the opportunity, asked ALL of our questions. I videotaped Fred Ortegas responses. Donna Jackson and Cassandra Dock -- It was the full Donna and Cassandra experience. They were knowledgeable, completely on point about Primes deficiencies, loud and at times disruptive. Donna in particular rattled off a lot of the details about Prime in California, apparently from memory. I had good discussion with both at the back of the room as the event dragged on. Interesting to note that Donna in particular is very critical of UH and Beth Israel (and has been for years) but complimentary of the care at St. Mikes, where her own mother got treatment for cancer. Seniors -- some of them asked skeptical questions, particularly about Prime being for-profit (I guess busing them in may not have been the enraptured audience they were hoping for). St. Marys Worker -- I heard that a worker from St. Marys also spoke up, saying, Prime promised to keep my job, too, and they didnt. I wasnt in the room when she spoke, though, so I wasnt able to track her down. Follow ups -- Gayle said this would be the first forum of many, and asked everyone to go to the primefornewarkcommunity website and fill out the petition. JNESO said theyd be giving comments at next Wednesdays Council Meeting, but no one else mentioned that.
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 23:28:34 +0000
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