Hospital Closings - So Who Cares?

Emily Friedman has written a blistering article in the August 6th issue of H&HN Magazine on the subject of hospital closings, one that I would suggest anyone with an interest in the healthcare system should read. She paints a bleak vision of the future, unless something changes in the way we view the delivery of healthcare to our citizens. While covering hospital closings for 30 years, she sees some common factors in the current spate of closings that "...are frightening as they are disheartening."

The first factor she cites is "market mania", the idea that market economics will make the healthcare system work for everyone. But, she notes that the "...economics of healthcare, far from being humane, have become Darwinian" with its reliance on a market ideology that, in her opinion, is a failed ideology. Unless, as she notes, "....you think that it's just fine to have 16 boutique hospitals in every wealthy suburb while people in poor communities die for lack of basic emergency care."

The second factor she discusses is "a lack of anything resembling planning." As Ms. Friedman notes, "...we plan golf-course communities, downtown renaissances, parks, transportation systems, olympic sites and public bathrooms; surely we can find a way to have at least a semi-rational distribution of hospital resources."

Ms. Friedman cites a number of other factors that have contributed to what she clearly feels is a critical turning point for the healthcare industry. With the growing disparity between the "have" and "have not" hospitals in terms of revenues, margins and access to capital, the "...question is whether the luckier hospitals feel any obligation to those that are vulnerable" and, I would add, do the well-to-do patients feel any obligation to those less fortunate.

Those of us on the business side of healthcare, such as Sun Capital HealthCare, Inc. which provides medical accounts receivable funding, can address financing for the healthcare industry, but as Ms. Friedman points out, there is a more profound question that the country as a whole must resolve and that is what do we want our hospital and healthcare system to be.