About 30 people are out of a job at University Hospital, which is shelving a unit it no longer needs as it searches for more efficiency, a hospital spokeswoman said today.
The 8th floor South unit was a cardiac unit that was kept open after the hospital started moving most of those patients to its new Heart & Vascular Institute in January, spokeswoman Rebecca Sylvester said.
But in light of declining revenues, “we’re looking at all services and seeing where we can work as efficiently as possible,” spokeswoman Rebecca Sylvester said.
The hospital has been hurt by a slight drop in volume that has resulted in a much larger drop in revenue in particular areas, she said. For instance, many patients who would have been admitted to the hospital as inpatients are instead going to 23-hour observation, which pays much less, she said. It is also a sign of the times.
“The economy has hit us over the past year much harder than we thought it would," she said.
The affected employees have known for a while that the change was coming, Ms. Sylvester said.
“(They) got a two-month notice,” she said. The hospital tried to find other positions within the organization, but in the end about 30 were affected, she said. There are no plans for across-the-board layoffs, however, Ms. Sylvester said.
Comments
There is fat in all aspects of our " 'health' 'system'," beginning with patients, through medical practices, hospitals, other medical care facilities and ending with private insurance companies and governmental "health" agencies. None of the stakeholders in this "system" will find the requisite "diet" appetizingly cheap, easy, quick or painless.
Sad for the 30 people that got laided off
This is not fat, it is declining utilization and subsequent reimbursement. If you are taking care of fewer patients, then you need fewer people. Not fat, just service volume.
With all of the overweight and unhealthy people in Augsuta, I would think the hospital would be doing a brisk business, especially a cardiac unit.
Part of the problem is many physician groups are starting their own "all in one" centers where they see patients in thier own buildings rather than have these patients seen in the hospital setting like they used to do. This is all about the physicians making more money and sharing less of it with the hospitals. I know a lady who was having a colonoscopy in one of the private offices, and the doc accidentally perforated her colon! She had to be rushed to the hospital for emergency surgery. Luckily, everything was okay, but there could've been serious complications. I know some doctors that wouldn't think of doing that procedure in thier office for fear of that exact thing happening. Anyway, it's all about money. I feel for those people who got laid off and hope they find something. However, something tells me that they might not have tried very hard to find another job if they'd been given a 2 month notice.
i smell a rat!!!!
I talked with a friend who works in an outpatient clinic at University and I was told 200 had been laid off. I was told this last week and she was concerned about some of her coworkers. There is more to this story than UH is telling.
medical expenses have been out of control for years and the lobbist paid off the politicians to vote in there favor.this is just one of many systems that do not work in america.other countries have systems where all get the attention they need when they need it but america is not smart enough to take notice or either they don't care about all of the citizens of this country.from my lifes experiences i prefer to believe the latter.i've seen terrible things happen in my time.
I don't know if any of the 30 were nurses or not but that means that the ones that are left will have a heavier load which means the quaility of patient care will go down. They advertise they need nurses and yet they give nurses so many patients they can't take care of them all. How do I know - been there done that. Can't do it anymore because of a disability. I loved nursing, it's a wonderful profession but all aspects of a hospital is needed. Housekeeping is needed. We wonder why if we are not sick when we go into the hospital but we get sick after we go into the hospital, could it be that there isn't enough housekeeping to keep the units clean as it used to be years ago when the rooms were cleaned every day to keep things like MRSA from happening or any other disease from spreading. The patients are not going to go away, but the quality of care is. Patients are being sent home when they need to stay. Of course insurances are in charge of how long we get to stay also. It's not the hospitals fault. There are just some things no one has control over. I really hate to see this happening.
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