They seem to be a well-meaning, impressive organization, but this does not change the fact that PWHS DOES NOT NEED A PARTNER.
Like Medicorp, Fauquier, Potomac and INOVA, we can do this on our own, we just need strong leadership who wants to do something other than sell.
It's great PWHS will keep its name. It's great there will still be a local board in place. It's great that they're non-profit....
BUT that does not change the fact that this is outside, corporate healthcare coming in and taking over our hospital. This does not change the fact that the CEO and his execs will get a massive payday out of this while there are no guarantees for other employees.
Never heard of Novant? Here's some background:
ReplyDeletehttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa5314/is_200006/ai_n21455889
Some insight into their current financial status:
http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2009/feb/11/novant-reports-174-million-loss-2008-drop-investme/
"The health-care system reported today that it had a $174 million loss last year despite reporting about $34 million in operating income.... Novant said it cut 17 jobs from its Salem Health Solutions division, which provides data analysis and warehousing. The cutback is expected to save about $3.2 million annually. Swindle said that nine employees were placed into other jobs at Novant and seven chose to take a severance package"
They can't save the jobs they already have. How are they going to save jobs in Manassas?
How is a place that lost $174 million last year looking to expand? This makes no sense. I think they're just looking to get Prince William into their network so they can sell to someone even bigger, maybe a for-profit hospital organization or even some non-healthcare corporation. The top executives *always* get big money out of mergers and acquisitions, do not let anyone tell you different.
ReplyDeleteOr Novant wants PWH now because it's there for the taking and it could be they're waiting for the economy to get worse and have a full-on Depression happen. Then the government will have to take over and buy all the hospitals - socialized medecine, government healthcare!
Then everyone owning the hospitals will get fat government checks or contracts or however it will work. Read behind the lines and try to look behind the curtain, people.
This partnership is like trying to put clean drapes on a dirty window.
ReplyDeleteCoverage from Novant's hometown:
ReplyDeletehttp://www2.journalnow.com/content/2009/mar/28/novant-enters-virginia-market-through-merger/
I was talking to some friends today who work at PWH. They are afraid to be a "follower" or afraid to write a comment because the atmosphere at the hospital is so hostile--they are afraid they will loose their jobs but they want to be involved to turn this around. Any ideas for them?
ReplyDeleteYou can show your support and be a blog Follower with a made up name and you don't even need to post a photo if you don't want, and you can always create a fresh email address with gmail or yahoo and use that. Keep in mind that even the blog-owners can't see the email addresses of their subscribers or followers, only the name you pick for themselves. You could use your actual real G-mail or what have you but choose your blog-name to be an alias.
ReplyDeleteI've communicated directly to blog's email address and got a response that they're meeting today and said that they will be addressing their suggestions for what employees do next. I think we're talking about some director or management types being involved too since the news broke right after the 9 AM meeting yesterday!
Great! Thank you mad bad Rad dad.
ReplyDeleteHi Folks, Any plan or word of a plan?
ReplyDelete