• A Message from Jim O'Connor
• Testimony to the
  Rightsizing Committee
• Berger Commission News
• Senator LaValle
  Supports St. Charles
• Doctor calls Berger Commission's
  recommendations 'dangerous'
• Port Jefferson Resolution
• Senate Confirms Daines
  as NY's Helath Commissioner
• The Maryhaven Letter
• Email Talking Points
• Your St. Charles Story

 

The Maryhaven Letter

James O’Connor, Executive Director St. Charles Hospital
Lewis Grossman, President/CEO Maryhaven Center of Hope

This year St. Charles Hospital celebrates its 100th Anniversary. From the very beginning, when 4 Sisters accepted 24 homeless children with disabilities into their care, the hospital’s hallmark service was providing compassionate care for all in need. That mission remains a priority at St. Charles.

Today the mission is particularly visible in St. Charles’s unique Outpatient Specialty Clinic. This Clinic provides medical services for patients with many varied diagnoses including cleft palate, muscular dystrophy, scoliosis, spina bifida, spinal cord injury, spasticity and more. More than 12,000 patients are treated annually in the Specialty Clinic. In addition, St. Charles’s Dental Clinic treats 6,000 patients each year, many of whom would not have access to proper dental treatment without the St. Charles Clinic.

The importance of these services is critical to this community however, without your support, there is a very real possibility that these services may no longer be available at St. Charles. In the coming months, St. Charles will have to deal with a list of recommendations by the New York State Department of Health (DOH) that became law on January 1, 2007. If the recommendations are implemented exactly as they stand right now, that could ultimately mean the end of this wonderful institution. The history behind this new law is as follows.

Former Governor George Pataki appointed a committee, The Commission on Health Care in the 21st Century (also know as The Berger Commission), to make recommendations regarding New York State’s hospitals and nursing homes for the purpose of downsizing of acute and long term care beds in order to curtail escalating health care costs. The report issued by the Berger Commission has major negative implications for residents of Port Jefferson and the surrounding communities.

In part, the Commission recommended that St. Charles Hospital undergo significant restructuring, eliminating a total of 77 medical/surgical beds, close its Emergency Department and accept 37 behavioral health beds from John T. Mather Hospital. At the same time, the Commission recommended that John T. Mather Hospital take 37 of St. Charles Hospital’s medical/surgical beds and absorb the additional volume in their emergency room.

These proposed recommendations have the potential to undermine St. Charles’s ability to survive, denying patients access to a health care resource with a 100-year history of providing cutting-edge orthopedic and rehabilitation services as well as providing much needed medical services for people with disabilities. The Commission has made recommendations which would result in the reduction of both the scope and quality of services currently being offered, resulting in both financial instability and increased risk to our patients. For instance, the population treated in the Dental Clinic cannot easily find replacement dental care covered by Medicare/Medicaid. In fact, Stony Brook University, who offers many clinics routinely, refers these patients to St. Charles. If St. Charles were unable to fund the Clinic, these services would not be available to the under and uninsured.

These recommendations, that are now law, cut to the heart of our community’s health care landscape, threaten patient safety and foreshadow further dramatic erosion to the accessibility of high quality care. St. Charles has been given an 18-month window to implement the recommendations, however we are asking the DOH to allow the hospitals in the existing Mather-St. Charles Health Alliance to continue to work together to achieve the goals of the Commission without compromising the future financial stability of either hospital.

It is very difficult for us to have to bring you this news. We are proud of the work we do and the patients we serve through both our Hospital and Outpatient Clinics. We are acutely aware of the difficulty you face in finding quality medical and dental care for the physically and developmentally disabled population. So, we ask your help in getting our message to Governor Spitzer in Albany and to our local Legislators. You must tell your story and let the decision-makers in our Government know why you believe that St. Charles Hospital needs to remain a financially viable, full-service health care institution.

 

St. Charles Hospital · 200 Belle Terre Road · Port Jefferson · NY 11777