THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 31, 1995 TAG: 9508310474
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY PAUL SOUTH, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: MANTEO LENGTH: Medium: 84 lines
Imagine a health-care facility on the Outer Banks that would combine the expertise of Pitt County Memorial Hospital, Chesapeake General, Chowan Hospital and Albemarle Hospital, as well as the East Carolina School of Medicine.
Imagine a clinic that would provide primary and specialty care, serve as a training ground for medical students and provide technical and managerial services to assist existing practice.
Officials from Pitt Memorial and the ECU School of Medicine unveiled that vision to a packed house at a special meeting of the Dare County Board of Commissioners Tuesday night.
The plan was outlined in a 43-page study by the Greenville hospital. The document, prepared by the accounting firm of Ernst and Young, outlined a number of suggestions concerning the health care needs of Dare County.
The best approach, the report said, to improving health care in the county would be through enhancement of the existing health care infrastructure.
Among its recommendations:
Develop a multispecialty practice that in its initial phase would provide family medical care, some pediatric services, psychiatric care and support services, such as lab and radiology services. The facility would house four or possibly five physicians, and would be designed to meet the growth needs of the area.
Possible locations for the facility include land owned in the county by the Elizabeth-City based Albemarle Hospital, or another location, possibly in the Kill Devil Hills area.
Determination of need for some type of temporary service and/or facility during the peak of the tourist season.
Provide additional specialty coverage for the county, in areas such as orthopedics, obstetrics and gynecology and dermatology, using the multispecialty facility as a base. Also, emphasis would be placed on pediatrics and geriatric medicine, based on the growth in the number of young families and retirees locating in Dare County.
It is estimated that by 1999, 20 percent of the population of Hatteras Island would be 65 or older, as would 16.9 percent in Kitty Hawk. Countywide, almost 13 percent of the population is exppected to be at least 65 by 1999.
The projections for the pediatric population are about the same.
Provide support to existing practices in the county through a Management Services Organization. The MSO would help in billing, human resources, technology and recruiting physicians.
Pitt Memorial Chief Executive Officer Dave McRae said the facility, if built, would not be a hospital in the traditional sense. Based on projections in the Ernst and Young report, building and operating a small 10-bed facility would be cost-prohibitive.
"The hospital of the future is a different breed of cat," McRae said. "It used to be that when you went into the hospital for a hernia operation, you had the surgery, were in the hospital for two weeks, and then recuperated at home for an additional two weeks. In the future, you would have the surgery done, go home, and then a home-health-care nurse would administer high-powered medication for pain, and you would go into your physician's office for the next several days. In the future, 80 percent of the surgery done will require a hospital stay of 72 hours or less."
McRae said the intent of the proposed facility would not be to drive existing health facilities and physicians out of business, nor to engage in a war for patients with Albemarle, Chesapeake, or Chowan hospitals, but to engage in a cooperative venture benefiting all health care providers and their patients in the area.
Provisions would also be made for the indigent.
"If we didn't take care of poor people, we'd be some pretty sorry folks," said Dr. Tom Irons, assistant vice chancellor of ECU Medical School.
Cost of the facility would depend on size and location, officials said.
The Pitt-ECU proposal got favorable reviews. A number of representatives of local hospitals were at the meeting, including Albemarle Hospital Board of Directors Chairman Wilma Harris.
"We believe in cooperation, caring and compassion," she said. "We'd like to see that put to work."
Commissioners were also supportive. Board Chairman Robert V. "Bobby" Owens Jr. said he would support the establishment of a blue-ribbon panel of citizens to study the proposal.
"We need to find a way to get the best medical care we can for the citizenry of Dare County," Owens said. ``That's our job."
The health-care study was commissioned and paid for by Pitt Memorial. by CNB