by Kristina Gabalski
Neighborhood meeting Feb. 28
Lakeside Health System has scheduled a Neighborhood Meeting at the Sweden Senior Center, 133 State Street, Brockport, Thursday, February 28 at 6:30 p.m. Doors open at 6 p.m. To share thoughts and opinions call 395-6092 or email hereforyou@lakesidehealth.org
This is the first such meeting in a proposed series.
Many in the Brockport community have been shocked and saddened by the recent announcement that Lakeside Health System is closing its emergency room and inpatient services as part of a transformation from an acute care hospital and emergency room to an outpatient diagnostic and treatment center.
Lakeside Acting CEO James Cummings sees the changes differently.
“I’m excited about the new Lakeside,” he tells the Suburban News and Hamlin-Clarkson Herald.
He says residents should not see the transformation as a loss to the community, but rather as a change that will help guide Lakeside toward the future.
“When the environment around you is changing, you have two choices,” Cummings says. “You can get up in the morning and do the same thing until you no longer exist or seize the change and decide what your role is in the new model and redevelop yourself in that vein.”
“Lakeside Health System is open now and will remain open,” Cummings says.
Full emergency room services will be available up until April 15.
“People can come in as they always have,” he says.
Inpatient services will end April 22.
The transformation of Lakeside reflects a shift in health care models, Cummings explains, a shift that is continuing to progress more and more rapidly towards care in physician offices and outpatient settings.
“The country is trying to control the cost of health care and inpatient and emergency room services have the highest cost,” Cummings says. “To reduce costs you want to reduce utilization.”
He says to continue to provide health care services to the community, Lakeside must work to fit into that trend.
“We want to be an outpatient based organization (which) supports physicians in the community,” Cummings says.
The current emergency room will be transformed into an urgent care center and Cummings says Lakeside hopes to have it up and running by the time the ER closes in mid-April.
He notes that urgent care visits are increasing and Lakeside will, “… provide urgent care services … and continue to meet those needs.”
Urgent care offers treatment for minor emergencies and acute and chronic illness and injury.
“If someone is suffering a heart attack or stroke or trauma (from a serious accident, for example) …. they will need to go to the other three health systems, but that’s something folks are doing already,” Cummings says.
In addition to urgent care, other medical services that will be available at Lakeside include out-patient surgery, endoscopy, diagnostic imaging and laboratory services, Cummings says.
The Beikirch Care Center will remain open and fully functional.
There will be many advantages to the new Lakeside, Cummings says. “We’re going to focus on those services most heavily utilized by the Brockport community and surrounding area and because of that utilization, our organization will be financially sustainable into the future. It’s about serving the community.”
He says that if the ER and inpatient services were to continue to stay open, “Those may have declined to a point where they were hardly used. We’re going to re-emerge as an organization which will be utilized and will meet community needs.”
Lakeside has a formal affiliation with the University of Rochester Medical Center and Cummings says Lakeside will continue to work to bring physician specialists to Brockport.
“We will rent space to such physicians,” he says, “(and) build the number of physician specialists in Brockport.”
Lakeside also has a collegial and supportive relationship with Unity Health System and Cummings says URMC may prefer that Unity provide some specialist services in Brockport.
“We want to keep both doors open,” he says.
The vacated inpatient units may eventually be allocated for future use as Lakeside will constantly assess what health care services the community needs, Cummings explains.
Regarding loss of jobs, Cummings says it’s too early for exact numbers, although some reports have said about one-third of Lakeside workers will lose their jobs.
Lakeside will hold job fairs on site to help employees find new positions. “We want to do everything possible to help those who may be displaced,” says Cummings.
Community reaction
Lakeside ER nurse Kathleen Fink says she was stunned to hear the ER was closing.
“The ED staff is devastated,” she says. “We are a very close-knit group. We know each other well because the core of us has been together for many years. We can work together in a crisis nearly without conversation because we’ve done so for so long and we anticipate each other’s actions and needs.”
She says many ER staff members are in their fifties and sixties and planned to retire from Lakeside.
“It’s a tremendous loss for the community, but the numbers cannot support this facility in Brockport any longer,” Fink adds.
Clarkson Supervisor Paul Kimball says the announcement was “a shock, but not surprising. It’s a very sad day for the community.”
Brockport Mayor Connie Castaneda says Lakeside has been a pillar and true asset to the community and called the potential loss of jobs devastating and unfortunate.
“It is regrettable that Brockport will be without an inpatient and emergency room. It is unfortunate but during hard economic times difficult decisions have to be made,” the mayor said. “The village has not been immune to this and has had to make difficult decisions that have also included cutting services to its residents.”
Brockport Village Trustee Margaret Blackman says, “As someone who has driven herself to the emergency room more than once, I am definitely going to miss that service – and the quality of service for sure. I’m concerned about the impact on the community, and I hope the closing of inpatient services doesn’t drive away the physicians in the affiliated medical offices.”
Trustee Carol Hannan says Lakeside has been like a beloved family member, “… always there to comfort and protect me … when I was born, when I was injured, when I sat at the beside of a grandparent during his final illness. A huge medical complex can’t replace Lakeside, but insurance companies and government policies seem to favor them to the exclusion of local hospitals. I hope the Lakeside complex will be successfully re-purposed to serve the community, but it won’t be the same and we’ve suffered a great loss.”
Sweden Town Supervisor Pat Connors says she, too, was shocked but not surprised and recognizes that health care is an evolving process.
“The closure of hospitals has been happening throughout the state for some time,” she says. “Health care is a business and when the business is losing money, you have to make adjustments. When it hits close to home it’s very unsettling. I am concerned about the impact to the people on the west side of the county as well as our neighbors in Orleans County as well as the impact to the local economy, possible loss of jobs and the effect on local businesses.”
Connors adds that she hopes Lakeside is successful in its transition to a diagnostic and treatment center and that they, “… obtain the State Health Department’s approval of their Transformational Business Plan.”
