"Health care panel ready for the job"

Danville Register & Bee
Tuesday, August 28, 2007

DANVILLE - The new Healthcare Leadership Council is now fully manned and ready to tackle its mission to provide communication between Danville Regional Medical Center and the community.
Two members each from Danville, Pittsylvania County and Caswell County, N.C., were appointed, as well as two Danville physicians and a representative from LifePoint Hospitals Inc., which owns the hospital.
Don Nodtvedt and Arlene Creasy will serve from Pittsylvania County, while Al Newman and Harold Williams will serve from Danville. Caswell County representatives are Shirley Deal and Mel Battle. Physician representatives are Drs. Bushan Pandya and Samuel Meadama. Jess Judy will represent LifePoint.
The panel was a recommendation of the Citizens Commission Related to the Danville Regional Medical Center, which gave its final report to City Council on July 3. Danville Mayor Wayne Williams appointed the original panel to look into issues relating to the hospital after LifePoint purchased it two years ago.
“The panel will act as an advisory group,” Mayor Wayne Williams said Monday. “It is a way for citizens to express their concerns and have those expressed to LifePoint.
“It is a group of trusted citizens separate from groups related to the hospital; therefore, they can offer an unbiased evaluation of what is happening at the hospital both good and bad.”
He said the group would serve for an extended duration, perhaps as long as a few years.
Williams selected the physicians who will serve on the board, while the heads of the governing groups of the city and two counties selected their representatives in consultation with the governing boards. Judy volunteered to represent LifePoint.
Creasy retired from the Social Security Administration. She said the panel will open communications between LifePoint management, physicians, staff and the community.
“The perception that is presently being communicated about the hospital … is not always facts - now we should be able to get the facts at the table,” she said.
Creasy said her community involvement will be a key benefit for the panel.
“I know, I see, and I hear from a lot of the people in the city and the county,” she said. “I can be a voice for the people and I am accessible for them. I bring the voice from the northern end of the county. We have medical options (Danville or Lynchburg) and we need to be sure this voice is heard.”
Nodtvedt, who retired last year as plant manager of Nestle, said he was excited to be on the panel.
“I want to make a difference, and if I can in any way be a bridge between the community, the doctors, the staff and the administration of the hospital, count me in,” Nodtvedt said.
“For whatever reason, LifePoint has not been able to have the right kind of relationship with the community. This panel can help establish that relationship such that there is a renewed confidence in the hospital by the community and the hospital can deliver to the needs of the community.”
Newman, a retired businessman with experience working in a medical clinic, said he has never had a bad experience as a patient at Danville Regional.
“I believe LifePoint is trying to get back to a care level that existed before the purchase,” Newman said Monday. “My desire is to help them in any way I can. I go on the board very optimistic. I hope the end will be that the community will once again have confidence in our medical community.”
Battle, a retired educator and former chairman of the Caswell County Board of Commissioners, said he has mixed emotions about care at the hospital.
“I received excellent treatment (at Danville Regional) when I had my heart attack,” Battle said Monday, “but some of my ER visits were not so good.”
Battle said the task force’s mission should be to advise and assist the hospital.
Judy, Gateway Division president for LifePoint, said, “My sense is that this panel will provide an objective group of people who have a goal of ensuring the quality and scope of health care for Danville that is appropriate for the community. It will also bring a sense of reason to the current state of the hospital and be able to clarify the perceptions that exist.
“It is clear the people who evaluate hospitals nationwide are finding the hospital compliant with health care standards, and this panel will serve an objective party to validate that for the citizens of the Dan River Region.”

"Regional foundation begins health assessment"

Star Tribune
Friday, August 24, 2007 8:10 AM EDT

DANVILLE - Danville Regional Foundation is conducting a formal assessment of the health of Danville, Pittsylvania and Caswell counties to use as a guide in developing strategies to improve the overall health of the community."One of our four areas of focus is health and wellness," said Karl Stauber, chief executive officer of the foundation. "We want to contribute to producing healthy people in healthy communities.
"To accomplish that goal, we begin by identifying the key health issues and learn where we stand as a community," said Stauber. "When we have collected the data and when we have the benefit of the opinions of the community, then the Foundation can consider long-term strategic action to address health issues."The foundation needs "to have an accurate and comprehensive picture of the community's health status, as well as ideas on how we can best utilize our resources," said Stauber."We take the snapshot by reaching out to the community to collect and analyze information, and that is what we expect to have from this assessment," he continued.The assessment is also intended to identify individuals and organizations interested in addressing health issues and trends.
A team from the Office of Rural and Community Health of East Tennessee State University will conduct the assessment, which will include interviews with individuals, discussions with health-related organizations and meetings with groups that represent a cross-section of the community.The health assessment will be completed in approximately 90 days.The foundation also will be conducting two additional assessments, one on education and workforce development capacity and the second on economic and community development.Danville Regional Foundation was established following the sale of Danville Regional Medical Center to LifePoint Hospitals Inc. for $210 million in 2005.In its two years, the foundation has announced grants of approximately $17.5 million to five not-for-profit organizations and governing agencies in Danville, Pittsylvania and Caswell counties.The new community center under construction on Main Street in Chatham was funded with a $3 million grant from the foundation.

"Moving on"

Danville Register and Bee
August 26, 2007

Danville Regional Medical Center remains a fully accredited hospital. After a bruising several months that seemed to validate critics of the hospital and its corporate parent, LifePoint Hospitals Inc., the hospital has emerged from the Joint Commission’s “preliminary denial of accreditation.”
Thursday’s news followed last month’s announcement from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that Danville Regional “remains in compliance” with Medicare standards.
The two announcements mean Danville Regional has proven itself to outside, independent agencies that look at thousands of health care facilities all over the country. It means that Danville Regional has fixed many, if not most, of its problems. It means the hospital deserves a second chance from its toughest critics.
That’s not a politically correct thing to say in some circles. Some people believe LifePoint is a spoiler of hospitals and that the Tennessee-based company destroyed our local hospital. But we’d like to think that the Joint Commission and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services know a thing or two about how a hospital is supposed to be run.
What does the future hold? If local residents don’t now support Danville Regional Medical Center, it will be difficult, if not impossible, for the hospital to remain a viable health care facility.
Consider the case of Dr. Lee McCann, who is leaving Danville Regional - where he serves as medical director of cardiovascular surgery - to take a position in Utah.
McCann’s practice has suffered, he claims, because fewer patients want to be treated at Danville Regional. It wouldn’t be surprising to hear a lot of local doctors say the same thing.
“Things have gotten so bad at Danville Regional that when we got another offer, we had to look at it,” McCann said. “… My office is now in the red, and I can’t keep losing money. Duke has probably lost money as well, and they are getting scared.”
Getting a man like Lee McCann educated and ready to practice medicine is a long, expensive process. Doctors need to be able to have financially viable practices. If McCann couldn’t attract enough patients to make enough money because local residents didn’t want to be treated at Danville Regional, what does that mean for the community?
Over time, fewer patients using the hospital would force the hospital to offer fewer services, which would decrease the number of patients, which would lead to future service cuts.
If that cycle continues, eventually everyone would be forced to go out of town for hospital care. That would have a profound, negative effect on everything from the quality of life to economic and community development in the Dan River Region.
It would be wrong to tell people to go to Danville Regional if the hospital wasn’t making real progress. People need more motivation that just a boilerplate call to support a local business.
But with the hospital showing demonstrative, positive and verified progress, shunning Danville Regional becomes an act of community suicide.
Danville needs a good, strong hospital, and this week’s news is a good step on the hospital’s part to rebuild its relationship with the community. It’s time for the community to take the next step - while it still can.

"Danville Regional Medical Center retains its accreditation"

Danville Register and Bee
Thursday, August 23, 2007
DANVILLE – The Joint Commission has notified Danville Regional Medical Center that it remains an accredited organization and that the Joint Commission has removed a preliminary denial of accreditation. Read the full story in Friday’s Register & Bee.

Read the report here:
http://media.gatewayva.com/registerbee/specials/Report.pdf

"Surgeon cites finances in departure"

Danville Register & Bee
Friday, August 17, 2007

DANVILLE - When Dr. Lee McCann moved to Danville two years ago, he thought his family would stay here until his children graduated from high school. His youngest of five children is 2.
Offers from other hospitals have come and gone throughout the two years McCann has been the medical director of cardiovascular surgery at Danville Regional Medical Center and on the staff at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C.
The doctor didn’t consider any of the offers, however, until about six months ago when his patient load decreased because, he believes, patients no longer wanted to be treated at DanvilleRegional.
“Things have gotten so bad at Danville Regional that when we got another offer, we had to look at it,” McCann said Monday. “You get offers all the time. We have gotten multiple offers over the last two years, and we haven’t even looked at them because we love it here and wanted to stay.”
His situation, however, has changed considerably since he came to Danville, accepting his first full-time job after 17 years of medicaleducation.“My office is now in the red, and I can’t keep losing money,” McCann said. “Duke has probably lost money as well, and they are getting scared.”When he got the offer from Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo, Utah, McCann told Dr. Peter Smith, chief of cardiovascular and thoracic surgery at Duke, he would have to consider it.
The hospital responds
Danville Regional spokesman John Van Mol said the hospital or its parent company, LifePoint Hospitals Inc., shouldn’t shoulder the blame for McCann’s departure.
“When there is an insufficient number of patients in a particular service line, there are almost always a variety of factors that cause it. A variety of reasons, too, no doubt caused the previous open heart surgeon at the hospital to make a decision to leave, well in advance of LifePoint’s purchase of the hospital,” Van Mol said Friday in a written statement. “Therefore, it is inaccurate to say low patient volume is ‘LifePoint’s fault,’ just as it is inaccurate to say it is ‘the surgeon’s fault’ or ‘Danville Regional’s fault,’ or ‘referring physicians’ fault.’”
A news release from the hospital issued Monday announced not only the departure of McCann, but also that Duke would work together with Danville Regional to conduct a “service line assessment” to “determine how (Danville Regional) and Duke will work together to improve cardiovascular care” at the hospital.
“(Duke) can’t keep pouring resources into the hospital,” McCann said. “Duke is afraid, and anything they put their name on has to succeed. Duke agreed to look at it, but by no means agreed to anything.
“They agreed to look at this mess and see if they can help fix it,” he added. “They might agree that it’s too bad, and they won’t go down in flames with the hospital. Or they could fix it, and it would cost Danville Regional a boatload of money.
“There are no guarantees from Duke. But, for all I know, they could turn around in a year and say they could do it. They’re not ruling any possibilities out.”
McCann said he and his wife have agonized over this for six months and have done everything they could to avoid it, but in the end he left because “I couldn’t pay my practice’s bills.”
Van Mol said, “It is true that the revenue from the practice has failed to cover its costs, but all the costs including full pay and benefits for Dr. McCann have been covered by Danville Regional and LifePoint.”
In his own announcement sent to his physician colleagues, McCann wrote, “The situation here has deteriorated to the point that the future of my fairly young career and that of my family are very insecure. Changes in the hospital ownership and administration, and, importantly, public perception of these changes have significantly altered our practice, both in terms of quality and volume.
“Frankly, patients no longer want to come to this hospital for cardiac surgical care despite my best efforts to establish a good program and a respectable reputation ... It will take time for the hospital to gain enough trust back so that patients will return.”During Monday’s interview, he said, “I would like to see the hospital survive and succeed, but in order to do that, there has to be open, honest dialogue. LifePoint needs to do that.”

‘a battle’
“What Dr. McCann says is true,” Dr. Gary Miller, a cardiologist and the hospital’s former chief of staff, said Tuesday. “He did like the community.”Miller called the heart program at Danville Regional a “best-kept secret.”“It was working,” he said. “The infection and mortality rates were extremely low, but people probably didn’t know that.“ But we do catheterizations and recommend surgery, but people say they have heard about the hospital and assume the heart program is not doing well, which it was. One section of the hospital is rubbing off on the other.”
Miller said the heart doctors have been seeing people with a relatively low risk for heart surgery, but the patients are refusing to have it done at Danville Regional and doctors have to send them elsewhere.“
It’s been a battle,” he said. “We’ve always had an agreement with Duke that we would send them the high-risk patients - those that have a 10 to 15 percent chance of dying - but when we have to give up people that will do well, that’s hard.”Miller said that the patient census has been very heavy the last few days, and he did seven angioplasties in seven days because of the effect the hot weather has had on people. “But I have known the surgery numbers have been down for some time because people are opting to go elsewhere because of the things that have gone on in the hospital,” Miller said. “There is always a small minority who have gone out of town (for care), but what has really hurt is that now the average Joe citizen who could stay here is leaving.”
Miller is hopeful, however, that the situation at the hospital will improve soon.“We’ve been working with LifePoint, and I think the interim people here are now much more responsive to the physicians and patients,” he said. “We are being listened to.”Miller said he is confident the hospital will retain its Joint Commission accreditation, but called the effect of McCann’s leaving “demoralizing.”
“The people who work there are proud of the heart program,” he said. “The whole team knew they were doing a good job, and it is very demoralizing to those who worked hard to bring the program here.
“If a program fails because they’re not doing a good job, that’s one thing, but it was not failing. It failed for other reasons.
“It’s a downward spiral, and it feeds on itself.”Miller said he thinks the doctors and nurses are gradually regaining the confidence of the patients.
“We’ve hired enough nurses,” he said. “Even though they are young nurses, we have enough. We have episodic shortages, but it’s not every day.
“But LifePoint has to continue to do what they said they would do. They have to provide enough staff and not worry about the bottom line. If we give good service and people are happy, then business will be good.“We still have a long way to go. We haven’t given up on the heart center. We are going to look at it.”

‘support the hospital’
Cardiologist Dr. Bosh Zakhary said the community deserves part of the blame for the low-patient census at the hospital. “I think the whole community is blaming the hospital, but part of the responsibility lies with the community,” he said Thursday. “The physicians haven’t changed, the programs haven’t changed and LifePoint has realized they have made mistakes and they are rectifying those.”
He took issue with a study that came out recently that reported higher mortality rates among heart patients at Danville Regional. In the study published in June, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, a division of the Health and Human Services, ranked Danville as one of the seven worst hospitals nationwide for heart attack mortality rates.
Although that study did not concern the cardiovascular surgery program McCann headed, Zakhary said the community was influenced by it. “The outcomes published recently on heart care were erroneous, and we are looking at this,” he said. “Other studies show better outcomes.”
Zakhary said people in the community were not happy with the sale of the hospital, so any time a problem is reported with the hospital, the community’s perception is blown out of proportion. “When people see the problems, they do not come to the hospital,” he said, “and that led to Dr. McCann leaving.”
Changes in the hospital, such as the flow in the emergency department and how heart patients are handled, are occurring, which will result in equal or better care than before the sale, Zakhary said.
“The rest will be up to the community,” he said. “They need to stay in town and support the hospital. We can only do what we can do.”

Draw your own conclusions...

Thanks to one of our regular contributors, I received a copy of the email letter from Jess to members of the medical staff. Here you go...from mid-July...


"Dear All,
Sorry I cannot be with you tonight. I would appreciate you all discussing how to deal with members of the Medical Staff who continue to misrepresent issues about the hospital and its future. For example, there are continued statements about the hospital being sold and even who is buying it. This is only serving to create more uncertainty among the staff and community causing much more damage locally than it is Lifepoint. It might be a good reminder for folks that we are a $2.4B company that can survive and actually do quite well even if a few of our hospitals do not. Lifepoint has no plans to sell DRMC.
Establishing competing businesses such as an ambulatory surgery center would be a lengthy COPN process and even if successful would further erode the economics of the hospital leading any owner with little choice but to reduce services. This might benefit the owners of the competing business while those who depend on the hospital for their practices would lose out.
While some might want something different the choices we have are to work together and collectively move DRMC in a positive direction or allow divisiveness and untruths to create a no win situation for us all. I trust you will take the cooperative approach and try to convince your colleagues to do the same.
We are committed to working with you and the Medical Staff and expect the DRMC executive team to fulfill that commitment. Thanks for taking time to serve on Medical Staff Action Committee. I know we can accomplish much with a shared vision of making DRMC the hospital of choice for the citizens of the Dan River Region. Take care and please let me know how I can help.

Jess"

"Medical director of Heart Center to leave for Utah position"

Danville Register & Bee
Tuesday, August 14, 2007

DANVILLE - Danville Regional Medical Center announced Monday that Dr. Lee McCann, medical director of the hospital’s Heart Center of the Piedmont, will be leaving to take a position at Utah Valley Regional Hospital in Provo, Utah.
With that announcement, the hospital also announced that it will be doing a “service line assessment” in collaboration with the clinical staff of the Duke Heart Center and local cardiologists to improve the cardiovascular care at Danville Regional.
The assessment will take approximately five months.
A hospital spokesman said he did not know if Danville Regional would be actively seeking a replacement for McCann while the assessment is being conducted.
McCann has been with Danville Regional for two years.
The Heart Center of the Piedmont was opened in 2003 and was affiliated with Duke Medical Center until December 2005 when Duke withdrew its affiliation. However, McCann continued to be part of the Duke staff and worked principally at Danville Regional.
McCann will leave for Utah in approximately six months.

Responses on DRMC's "News & Views" website

DRMC is responding to questions from visitors to their "News & Views" site, so I thought I'd post them here for your reference. Regardless of your opinion about the answers given, kudos to DRMC for starting the site and answering questions in a very timely manner.

What “expansion” plans were actually planned by DRMC prior to LifePoint’s purchase? Was LifePoint following through on previously initiated projects? Is LifePoint taking credit for these projects?
Obviously, there is a big difference financially in planning an expansion and actually paying for it after the planning is completed. LifePoint is following through, as you put it, on certain projects that had been in the planning stages before the acquisition, thus far to the tune of approximately $29 million by the end of 2007. And yes, funding certain projects was part of the asset purchase agreement under which the hospital was acquired. “Taking credit” is probably in the eyes of the beholder. It seems likely those previously responsible for DRMC should “take credit” for planning the expansions and getting them put into the asset purchase agreement, and it’s equally logical that LifePoint should “take credit” for spending corporate funds to complete the work. No matter who gets or takes the credit, by the end of the year, the community is scheduled to have $29 million more in needed health care assets than it did before the acquisition took place.

Does LifePoint have a seat at the leadership council table and what will it do with the findings?
We will have a seat at the table with Mr. Jess Judy’s involvement on the leadership council as well as our new CEO when he or she is hired. Danville Regional Medical Center is committed to being a high-quality medical center that meets this community’s health care needs. We welcome the suggestions of the leadership council toward meeting that goal.


http://danvillenewsandviews.com/index.php/site/homepage/

"Leaders discuss hospital panel"

Danville Register & Bee
Thursday, August 9, 2007

DANVILLE - A new Health Leadership Council will be formed to communicate concerns between the public and Danville Regional Medical Center, which is owned by LifePoint Hospitals Inc.
The Citizens’ Commission, which explored what is good and bad about services at the hospital through public forums, recommended the formation of a permanent council.
Mayor Wayne Williams; George Ward, chairman of the Caswell County (N.C.) Board of Commissioners; Caswell County Manager Kevin B. Howard; and Coy Harville, chairman of the Pittsylvania County Board of Supervisors, met with representatives from Danville Regional and concerned citizens Wednesday to discuss the new council.
No decisions were made on who would sit on the council, but nine people - two each from Danville, Pittsylvania County and Caswell County, as well as two physicians and one LifePoint executive - will be appointed to two-year terms.
The purpose of the council will be communicating the public’s concerns to the hospital and making sure the public is kept informed of what Danville Regional is doing in response to their concerns.
Williams said he hoped the council could operate autonomously, create their own bylaws and work at regaining trust in the hospital.
The panel will meet again in about two weeks to discuss their candidates for the Health Leadership Council.

"County names representatives"

Star Tribune -- August 7, 2007

Westover District Supervisor Coy Harville said Monday night he would appoint Don Nodtvedt and Arlene Creasy to represent the county on a leadership group to work with Danville Regional Medical Center and its parent company, Tennessee-based LifePoint Hospitals.A citizens commission that spent four months hearing concerns about the hospital had recommended the panel. Making its report to Danville City Council last month, the commission said the new panel should have members from the region, including physicians and community leaders.
Harville, who chairs the Board of Supervisors, said Danville and Caswell County, N.C., would also have two members. He said officials would meet Wednesday about the panel.Harville said he wants the group to gather community input about the hospital and provide it to LifePoint.

Something to ponder...

Today's editorial got me to thinking....from a PR perspective, at what point can an organization's reputation in its community (either neutral or negative) impact the idea of charity or community service in the public's mind?

http://www.registerbee.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=DRB%2FMGArticle%2FDRB_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1173352276754&path=%21news%21opinion

Your thoughts?

DRMC open line...part deux

This post was in a couple of threads, so I thought I'd bring it to the front page...it's a question posted on the "News & Views" website. (http://danvillenewsandviews.com/)

"Why was the Danville Regional executive team in Nashville last week? To discuss downsizing at DRMC?
The Danville Regional Medical Center leadership team was in Tennessee, along with their counterparts from all of the company’s hospitals, to attend the annual operations meeting. There are no plans to downsize DRMC. Rather, there are plans to continue to increase services at DRMC with the expansion on the sixth floor, the purchase of a linear accelerator and additional diagnostic equipment."

"What can money do?"

Danville Register and Bee editorial
Sunday, August 5, 2007

One of Danville’s newest residents, Karl Stauber, started his new job as president and CEO of the Danville Regional Foundation this week wondering how the catastrophic collapse of an Interstate highway bridge in his old hometown is affecting life there.
Stauber is in the process of moving from Minneapolis, where a mammoth bridge over the Mississippi River collapsed during rush hour this week. Stauber’s wife is still living in the Twin Cities, but she wasn’t harmed in the incident.
Unexpected catastrophic events challenge communities. Some of them are able to shake off tragedy and loss, while others have a tougher time coming to grips with what has happened to them.
In many ways, that describes Danville today. The city has a lot of assets, but it has also lost a lot of its former identity. Complicating matters for Stauber is the controversial founding of the Danville Regional Foundation.
The foundation was formed with $200 million LifePoint Hospitals Inc. paid for Danville Regional Medical Center two years ago. The board of directors that sold the hospital became the founding board members of the foundation. That ignited a controversy that continues to this day.
To his advantage, Stauber is aware of the situation he has come into. To his credit, he appears willing to work hard to help the foundation use its assets - estimated to be approximately $10 million per year - to advance the health, education and welfare of the people of Danville, Pittsylvania County and Caswell County, N.C.
In all likelihood, the way the Danville Regional Foundation started - and the problems experienced at Danville Regional Medical Center over the past two years - will continue to follow Dr. Bob Ashby, James A. Motley, Richard Barkhouser, Ben Davenport and Charles Majors. It’s a problem between those five men and what is, in all likelihood, a fairly large segment of the community.
But the Danville Regional Foundation has the kind of community-changing resources that can easily outlive the controversy over the foundation’s birth. A year ago, the foundation gave $2 million to build a senior community center in Yanceyville, N.C.; $3 million to Chatham Cares Inc. to build a community center in Chatham; $9.7 million to Danville Community College to build a health sciences center; and $1.7 million to the Danville-Pittsylvania Regional Industrial Facility Authority for a research building in the Cyber Park.
Those grants, totaling $16.4 million, were made to settle a dispute with the IRS. Once the Danville Regional Foundation starts making annual grants, it’s expected to spend $10 million per year - a staggering $100 million over the course of a decade.
How will the projects funded with that money - over time - change this community? Many local people have longed for positive change. The Danville Regional Foundation is one way to bring about those positive changes.
“I’m excited about the opportunities here,” Stauber said this week. “I think right now Danville is an undiscovered secret.”
Stauber’s extensive background should help the Danville Regional Foundation find and support vital community-changing projects.