Downtown’s Leading Officials Gather Across From Hospital
By Raanan Geberer
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
COBBLE HILL — Some of Downtown Brooklyn’s most powerful elected officials, led by Councilman Bill de Blasio (D-Park Slope, Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill), gathered across from Long Island College Hospital to criticize the hospital’s recent decision to cut its bed capacity by about half, sell several of its buildings, and phase out its obstetrics unit.
When the announcement was made last week, Stanley Brezenoff, CEO of Continuum Partners, LICH’s parent body, said these measures were necessary to pay off the hospital debt, estimated at $170 million. Continuum also owns Beth Israel and St. Luke’s-Roosevelt in Manhattan.
Those at yesterday’s rally didn’t doubt that LICH, like all hospitals, was facing tough times. De Blasio mentioned that Victory Hospital in Bay Ridge, St. Mary’s Hospital in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Interfaith Hospital in Bedford-Stuyvesant have all closed or radically downsized within the past few years. However, the officials urged the hospital to make every effort possible to keep all its facilities open.
De Blasio revealed that he had met with Dominick Stanzione, LICH’s new CEO, recently, and that Stanzione had impressed him with his sincerity. However, de Blasio and others were dismayed that Brezenoff had called them with news of the cutbacks only a day before they were announced to the public.
State Sen. Marty Connor asked why, when Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens’ populations are growing younger, the hospital would choose to cut its maternity ward. “Maybe instead, they should have cut gerontology,” said the veteran political leader.
“They say they are losing money with obstetrics and gynecology,” said Connor. “Well, from what this layman understands, every hospital loses money with obstetrics and gynecology. It’s what the supermarket calls a ‘loss leader,’ because maternity patients form relationships with doctors whom they continue to use.”
Many, especially veteran Cobble Hill activist Murray Adams, charged that the hospital has insufficiently publicized and marketed itself. The survival of LICH, said Adams, depends on it “expanding its patient base, and expanding its medical staff.”
“With all due respect,” said de Blasio, “Lutheran Medical Center, Maimonides Medical Center and New York Methodist Hospital are in an advertising war, and you can hardly turn around in Brooklyn without seeing an ad from one of them. You can’t say the same for LICH.”
On the subject of Lutheran, Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez said, “Lutheran came to us and asked us to get more money from the federal government for its baby unit, and we did it. Why can’t LICH do the same thing?”
Although this rally, unlike an earlier one, was not sponsored by the hospital’s medical staff, many staffers, from nurses to technicians to social workers to doctors, were seen in the crowd. One nurse said closing some units of the hospital would hurt employees in other units, since senior workers from the shut-down units would then “bump” others who hadn’t been there as long.
Jim Mandler, spokesman for Continuum, said, “We have the utmost respect for our public officials, and we understand why they would have concerns about the restructuring at LICH. But we reiterate what we have been saying since the plan was proposed last week, and this is a plan to save Long Island College Hospital.
“There is no intent on our part to close Long Island College Hospital and to prevent bankruptcy.”
© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2008
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Just a reminder, though -- It’s not considered polite to paste the entire story on your blog. Most blogs post a summary or the first paragraph,( 40 words) then post a link to the rest of the story. That helps increase click-throughs for everyone, and minimizes copyright issues.
So please keep posting, but not the entire article. arturc at att.net
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