On Friday, Southern Inyo Hospital Administrator Lee Barron reportedly headed to Sacramento to join other hospital officials to try to change Assembly Bill 97 which cuts Medi-Cal reimbursements. For Southern Inyo Hospital’s Skilled Nursing Facility, the bill would make a 46% cut, and Lone Pine officials say the cuts could lead to closure of the nursing facility, the hospital itself and its clinic. Officials urge citizens to immediately send letters to Sacramento.
Not only would AB97 cut Medi-Cal reimbursements by nearly half in the future but also demand retroactive pay back. For Southern Inyo Hospital, that’s $1.5 million. Plus, the annual revenue loss will amount to around $900,000 or 11.5% of the hospital operating budget.
Lone Pine Chamber of Commerce President Marian Seiter (Sight-er) said that if Southern Inyo Hospital has to cut jobs and services, “every single citizen in Southern Inyo plus all our visitors will be negatively affected.” While hospital officials push legislators to see the devastation from severe Medi-Cal reimbursement cuts, others continue to fight through a lawsuit filed by the California Medical Association and many others. President of the CMA, Dr. Paul Phinney, was quoted as saying that the Medi-Cal cuts to providers will “have a huge impact on patient access to care.”
The lawsuit also says that the proposed Medi-Cal cuts could close hospitals. According to the CMA, there is currently a court injunction on the Medi-Cal cuts pending a full Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling. (Contact emails, addresses and fax numbers follow for sending letters and comments.)
Emails:
Senator Jean Fuller email – <mailto:[email protected]>
[email protected]
Congresswoman Connie Conway – <mailto:[email protected]>
[email protected]
Letters can go to:
Diana Dooley
Secretary, DHCS (Department of Health Care Services)
PO Box 997413
Sacramento, CA 95889-7413
Toby Douglas
Director, DHCS
PO Box 997413 , MS:0000
Sacramento, CA 95889-7413
Senator Jean Fuller
18th Senate District
State Capitol, Room 3063
Sacramento, CA 95814
Fax: 916-322-3304
Fax: 661-323-0446
Assemblywoman Connie Conway
34th Assembly District
State Capitol Office Rm 2174
Sacramento, CA 94249-0034
Fax: 559-636-4484
Were so blessed to have southern Inyo hospital and the clinic ❤ thank you bishop care center for taking care of our residents ❤ through our bumpy ride to get our hospital back open ❤ thank you
I have lived in Lone Pine for a while, and I have school-aged kids. I would strongly re-consider living here if there were no medical services available for 60+ miles. I think lack of medical services would cause a lot of families to leave or not move here in the… Read more »
As a new resident of the area, I visited SIH to check it out before deciding to move here. I can tell you categorically that I would NOT have moved here if SIH did not exist. The next closest hospital is 40-45 minutes away, critical time if one suffered a… Read more »
So are they going to close MT Whitney too, what if I have a medical issue while hiking the Mountains? how long will it take to get to me then to a hospital, 2-3 hours….I think I would be dead by then….or if I have a heart attack in my… Read more »
Then they should have an outside review done of all operations including the elder care unit from environmental staff to administration and weed out obvious miss diagnosis, nepotism, and poor communication
(Taking foot out of mouth).
It would be a shame for residents to have to get there services elsewhere, since not everybody has the ability to travel.
Get on the phone, write some letters, and do what we can to get the well needed help to SIH.
So I guess all the people that choose not to go because of what they have heard and/or aware of have nothing to worry about? and those concerns that the public have are invalid?? Something has been wrong for awhile and I feel those who are currently employed shouldn’t let… Read more »
Until they change there ER doc.and the fact that they over test, I believe they should be shut down
SIH, is an excellent provider of healthcare services and has benfited many families and visitors in the community. Also past employee, dont let your personal bias make you such a selfish person that you would actually like to see families, visitors and our comminity suffer. Let us all fight for… Read more »
From personal experience, elder care unit is run like a high school w/o teachers and on a number of occasions I have witnessed the ER doc miss diagnose problems cause he was to impatient to wait for labs, I have seen a hand full of cases like this and so… Read more »
past employee – Defensive testing is a common practice throughout the current healthcare system. A physician will gladly run a test to detect a 1-100 disease if the other option is 3 years in court for missing a rare diagnosis. Tort reform is an important component of healthcare reform because… Read more »
And Mammoth is worried about their police.