DATE: Thursday, August 28, 1997             TAG: 9708280519

SECTION: FRONT                   PAGE: A1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MARIE JOYCE, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS                      LENGTH:  104 lines

STATE HALTS ADMISSIONS TO NEWPORT NEWS GENERAL AGENCY CITE APPARENT VIOLATIONS IN CLOSING THE TROUBLED HOSPITAL.

The Virginia Health Department shut down Newport News General Hospital after inspectors found apparent violations of state and federal regulations, a department official said Wednesday.

State authorities told the hospital to stop admitting patients as of Tuesday, said Nancy R. Hofheimer, director of the department's Center for Quality Health Care Services and Consumer Protection.

Newport News General, which is facing serious financial problems, voluntarily transferred the few patients there, Hofheimer said. All patient care had stopped by Wednesday afternoon, hospital officials said.

Such drastic action is very unusual. Hofheimer said it's the first time the state has stopped all admissions at a hospital in the 3 1/2 years she's held her post.

State officials will not say what they found wrong at Newport News General until they have submitted a written report to the hospital, probably early next week.

Hofheimer did say, however, that the office knows of no patients who were seriously harmed as a result of the problems.

Newport News General is one of only a few remaining hospitals in the country founded to serve African Americans.

The acting hospital administrator referred questions to the facility's lawyer, Oscar Blayton, who said he had been out of town and didn't know the hospital was in trouble with the state.

``That is news to me,'' he said.

He said the hospital board voted Tuesday night to cease patient care because ``the hospital needs to reorganize and look at the delivery of the services it has been giving.''

Leaders of the hospital will re-evaluate its direction and hope to open some of the departments again within 30 days, Blayton said. He said leaders would be looking not only at patient care but also at all other operations, including personnel and financial issues.

Although patient care has stopped, administrative departments like the one handling patient records remain open, he said.

The facility's two overnight patients are gone - one discharged and one apparently transferred, Blayton said.

Blayton said the hospital's leaders hoped to reopen the facility's outpatient clinic first, followed by other departments serving same-day patients.

He said leaders want the hospital to eventually return to providing traditional, overnight service. But that goal faces serious obstacles.

``Basically the residents of the Newport News area have voted with their feet. That clientele, in my opinion, is never coming back,'' said Paul M. Boynton, executive director of the Eastern Virginia Health Systems Agency. The agency is a state-appointed body that monitors hospital expansions.

The hospital is in the midst of bankruptcy reorganization. Several weeks ago, the board voted to dismiss administrator Alvin Bryant, a surgeon who had been serving as a volunteer, Blayton said.

Blayton said Steven Grant, a Peninsula native who is an employee of DePaul Medical Center in Norfolk, has volunteered to serve as interim administrator. Grant did not return several phone calls Wednesday.

The state became involved after officials received at least one complaint about quality of care at Newport News General, Hofheimer said.

She said the hospital must respond to the state's findings with a plan to correct the problems.

Hospital leaders have been very cooperative, she said, and she believes they will fix the problems ``if they have the necessary resources and staff.''

Blayton said the current leadership, which took over the hospital in late 1995, is is hampered in part by problems inherited from the previous administration.

In the past, the hospital has been cited for inefficiencies by a state watchdog group, problems that included overstaffing, poor use of high-tech services, and a lack of cash on hand to cover debt.

However, the hospital also is a victim of forces that are changing health care and threatening the few remaining hospitals that were started by African Americans.

At one time, black-owned facilities were typically the only source of hospital care for black patients.

But when health care became integrated in the 1960s, white doctors began shifting their patients, and patients themselves sought out the generally better-financed facilities.

``It was essentially established because we had legalized racism,'' said Boynton of the health systems agency. ``The closing of Newport News General (is) an inadvertent tribute to the amount of integration that occurred in health care.''

The 1990s have been a rough ride for most hospitals, whatever their background, and facilities around the country have closed.

Managed care, a type of health insurance that aims to cut costs in part by reducing hospital stays, has hurt the bottom line. And improved technology means that some procedures that once required an overnight stay can now be done as same-day surgery.

Newport News General has run at an average loss of about 7 percent over the past three years, according to a state database on hospital finances.

In 1995, the hospital had an average census of roughly 30 patients a day, and probably about half of those were in a psychiatric unit, not general medical units, according to statistics compiled by Boynton's office. ILLUSTRATION: Photo

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Officials at Newport News General, which the state has closed, hope

to reopen some departments within 30 days. The state noted that it

knows of no patients who were seriously harmed as a result of the

hospital's problems. KEYWORDS: NEWPORT NEWS GENERAL HOSPITAL INVESTIGATION CLOSING

SHUTDOWN

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