Contracts for LICH doctors expiring, no renewals coming from SUNY
Patients: 'Where are the ambulances?'
Doctors at Long Island College Hospital (LICH), who were previously notified by SUNY Downstate that they would be terminated on September 9, have not yet received contract extensions, hindering efforts to resume critical services at LICH as ordered by state Supreme Court Justice Carolyn Demarest.
“I have doctors calling me daily,” said Dr. Toomas Sorra, president of Concerned Physicians of LICH, a doctors’ group that has been working to save the embattled Cobble Hill hospital. “No full time or part time doctors have received renewal extensions. Until Justice Demarest nails down a decision, SUNY still calls the shots. It’s a mess.”
Dr. Sorra added that doctors at the LICH clinic on Montague Street in Brooklyn Heights have not been able to schedule any patient visits past this upcoming Friday. “They’ve received zero information. They don’t know their malpractice status and they’re completely in limbo,” he said.
Cash-strapped SUNY Downstate took over LICH, a 155-year-old hospital serving northwestern Brooklyn, two years ago from Continuum Health Partners under an arrangement signed off on by Justice Demarest. Under the agreement, SUNY received all of LICH’s valuable assets in return for keeping the hospital in operation.