Only Fifteen?
Dear Editor: It’s beyond belief that SEARHC will only allow 15 persons to attend the Sitka Community Health Council meeting on Feb. 7, 2024. Even more incredible? This is a once-a-year-ONLY opportunity that allows Sitkans with concerns about SEARHC to be-heard.
This meeting is by “invitation only,” via Zoom, three minutes of testimony per person.
There is no opportunity for those unable to “attend” to know what was said or done.
One hundred-fifty concerned citizens attended the Sitka Woman’s Club listening session regarding Home Health. Hundreds of Sitkans signed a petition encouraging SEARHC to reconsider their closure of Home Health. You may remember how their names filled an entire page in the Sentinel.
Fifteen opportunities to speak directly to SEARHC – once a year for three minutes each – by Zoom?
Really?
It seems there are at least two possibilities here:
1. SEARHC recognizes this opportunity to build a true partnership with Sitka, open, honest and responsive. Sitka is a talented, diverse community, a rich, untapped resource for SEARHC. This community wants SEARHC to succeed. Other hospital systems who have partnered this way have gone on to be recognized for their excellence, including winning coveted “Blue Zone” awards.
2. Continue locking up market share by acquiring/driving out competition (monopoly), removing valued community programs that are not “money makers,” increasing reliance on high-tech systems to raise profit whether or not it results in better outcomes or improved patient experience.
An example is patient billing. SEARHC’s decision to expand their contract with Xtend Healthcare with a high-tech “revenue capture plan” has “improved their cash collections and lowered their cost to collect.” (SEARHC Announces New Revenue Unit - Sentinel 10/03/23).
However, billing problems persist. Why? SEARHC has always had problems with correctly coding services to be billed. Instead of recognizing and correcting those issues first, the problems were also outsourced. It appears the biggest improvement is in tracking down debtors and collecting no matter if the bill is correct.
Xtend Healthcare is a subsidiary of Navient, the student loan processor that agreed to a $1.85 billion court settlement in 2022. This was for repeatedly engaging in fraudulent and abusive practices including continuing to collect on student loans that were forgiven by the federal government.
Being profitable does not rule out being good at what you do. SEARHC can expand their vision. Perhaps something similar to work the city did with fishermen on the Sitka Harbors Master Plan. The fleet was saved and the plan improved with the fishermen’s unique knowledge.
If you would like to attend and/or testify at the Wednesday (noon-1:30 p.m.) Sitka Community Health Council meeting, please email Brandi at bbowles@search.org to request an invitation. Today.
Mary Ann Peterson, Sitka
SEARHC Meeting
Dear Editor: Last November’s Listening Session on the closure of the SEARHC Home Health Department, organized by the Sitka Woman’s Club, was attended by 150 Sitkans. SEARHC, though invited, did not come. SEARHC senior vice president Dr Bruhl later explained that SEARHC’s protocol was to offer a listening opportunity once a year during a meeting of the SEARHC Sitka Community Health Council.
This council meeting is scheduled as a Zoom meeting from noon to 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 7. Only 15 Sitkans will be allowed to speak, each for three minutes. This is the one opportunity this year to officially express any opinions/concerns to SEARHC on any topic relevant to SEARHC services in Sitka. To get a link to attend or testify, email bbowles@searhc.org.
I feel it is unfortunate that SEARHC and the Health Council have chosen to offer such a limited forum. It suggests that SEARHC has little interest in the opinions of Sitkans.
I hope that concerned Sitkans will request the Zoom link and listen. Simply showing up on Zoom shows that Sitkans have questions and concerns.
I am particularly concerned about the closure of the Home Health Department. Dr. Bruhl has said it was closed as a business decision. In other words it was not making money for SEARHC. While SEARHC has said it has been replaced by an equivalent or better Outpatient Home Care Program, I do not feel the replacement is equivalent or better.
The new program is no longer 100% covered for Medicare recipients. Now there is a 20% copay for Medicare recipients. This is not equivalent or better.
Data now available from Kevin Mosher’s recent meeting with Dr. Bruhl shows the service is quite different. The average number of different patients per month seen by home health nurses has halved: from 24 to 12.6. The average number of patient visits by nursing has quartered: from 100 to 25. The number of full-time nurses dedicated to home care was three and is now one. It is now longer a comprehensive home care system, something which Dr. Bruhl now has admitted. This reduced service is not equivalent or better.
Dr. Bruhl is correct that the new system can provide home visits for some patients who did not qualify for the medicare-certified services. Examples are home PT for postpartum moms and home pediatric visits. But SEARHC could have been providing those services all along. It does not have to be an either/or situation. SEARHC could restore its former Medicare-certified Home Health Department, providing comprehensive care to Sitkan’s elders, 100% covered by Medicare, and provide money-generating home visits to others from its outpatient-based Home Care Program.
Restoring the former Home Health Department would be consistent with SEARHC’s mission “to provide the best care in our communities,” and consistent with the SEARHC promises which I heard when SEARHC and Sitka Community Hospital merged, namely, to provide improved care for Sitkans. Currently care to Sitkans has been diminished.
Connie Kreiss, M.D., Sitka
