New Orleans officials: Charity Hospital should stop wasting money on the poor

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NEW ORLEANS - Charity Hospital, which for nearly three centuries has been dedicated to treating the poorest and sickest here, has been abandoned downtown since Hurricane Katrina. It is now at the center of a battle over whether it will continue that tradition, or become a more conventional hospital.

The state officials who manage Charity say Hurricane Katrina dealt this Huey Long-era landmark a death blow and want it torn down. In its place, they say, they want to build a hospital with a "new mission," one that treats both public and private patients and relies less on government money.

But doctors who work there sharply disagree with that plan. They say Louisiana officials are using the storm as an excuse to achieve the state's long-sought goal of demolishing Charity, getting millions in federal dollars to build a new hospital, and then moving away from a promise that has long been made to the city's poor.

"People want to use these disasters to get insurance money," said Dr. James Moises, an emergency room physician at Charity who helped in the cleanup after the storm. Louisiana officials "saw it as a great opportunity to get the federal government to pay for a new facility," he said.

For months now, university officials have barred doctors from the building and forced them to practice in a tent field hospital, even though the doctors say the hospital is ready for use. The doctors say the makeshift arrangement is inadequate for the severe trauma cases the hospital specializes in treating.

As one of the two oldest hospitals in North America — it was founded in 1736, the same year as Bellevue Hospital in New York — Charity has from the beginning been a symbol of a social commitment to the poor. In many ways, the debate over its future parallels that of New Orleans itself, as it chooses whether to become a more middle-class city.

Louisiana is the only state with a network of hospitals dedicated to serving the indigent, a legacy of the populist Gov. Long.

Don Smithburg, chief executive of Louisiana State University Hospitals, which runs Charity, said any replacement for the hospital should be based on a "new model, less reliant on public dollars," with a "new mission" — one serving both private and indigent patients. "This storm has told us you can't rely on government resources," he said.

In recent decades the old hospital has lurched from crisis to crisis. Even its most ardent defenders acknowledged that the building needed an overhaul before Hurricane Katrina. But they say that now, with this city still in crisis, is not the time to close any health care option, even one that is less than ideal.

On a recent warm day here, the emergency room at Charity was empty, worn-looking but hardly derelict. The only sound was from a security guard's television set. She had seen it all: gunshot victims, rape victims, stabbing victims, inmates, as well as legions of the uninsured.

"We had all that going on here," said the guard, Donna Jennings. "Now, we have nothing. This is just about where the average person came. Now, I don't know. Where are all the gunshot victims going to go?"
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http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nation/3530970.html
 
I always thought hospitals couldn't turn away the poor and uninsured, so why wouldn't a modern hospital be sufficient? What does every other city do, like Philly, Camden, Chicago, Detroit, etc.?
 
They can't turn you away if you're dying, but that's usually about the limit of what most hospitals are legally required to do. They very rarely have to do anything more than the minimum required to save your life. Its not a life-threatening problem, just one that causes you constant severe pain and makes life impossible to live? Ok, have fun, buh-bye.
 
[quote name='PittsburghAfterDark']Now, which party has elected officials running New Orleans and has for decades?

Hmmmmmm.

****Hums the final Jeopardy theme.****[/QUOTE]

I seriously doubt the republicans are opposed to this. Also, hospitals like this are the result of huey long. He was the governor and a senator of Louisiana and was an early front runner in the 1936 presidential elections. He was assasinated in the 1930's by someone opposed to his political views.
 
[quote name='E-Z-B']I always thought hospitals couldn't turn away the poor and uninsured, so why wouldn't a modern hospital be sufficient? What does every other city do, like Philly, Camden, Chicago, Detroit, etc.?[/QUOTE]

Like drocket said. They also stick you with a huge bill afterward.
 
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