Help me understand the latest fear reports that ICU units are full and the fear of overcrowded hospital's. Hospital's have had since March to prepare and add more beds to ICU units. Some say it's a lack of staffing. I know the Meridian Hospital's have cut back nurses hours. Docs are also losing hours and pay is getting cut. Have hospitals drop the ball or is the media spreading false fear.
Hospitals
- Thread starter dawgdreamin
- Start date
Our government leaders dropped the ball. And they haven't cared to pick it back up to this point.
Obamacare cost Hospitals a ton of money...it cost the one my wife works at about $30 Million.... it pushes Doctors out of the profession...Nurse Practioners aren’t qualified to battle Covid
No, our governor refusing to accept billions in federal money hurt hospitals. Not one single hospital administrator supported Tator Tot.
This poster speaks truth. Tater Tot could give a 17 about hospitals before March.
Wrong. Republicans refusing to accept money from the feds due to Obamacare is the reason for losing money. Also, NPs are fine to deal with covid. Hell RNs are fine to do it. But there is a difference in a NP and RN that are trained for the ICU. It’s more to do with equipment and procedures than skill level.
You may be seeing those reports because hospitals are running out of ICU space and/or personnel who are healthy and have adequate training. Occam's razor and all.
is this true? Any links, would love to read more about that.
And ron Polk is right...a floor nurse etc... are most likely not trained in critical care. Sure, in an emergency they’d pull those folks through...
Last edited:
The money was only temporary. Once it was gone it was going to be up to the States to keep it going. That is when the price tag would have hit.
Incorrect. It was going to be a billion each year but the state or participants had to cover other costs. The hospital association provided a plan. I think it was MS Cares or something. Hospitals lose like $600 million + a year to nonpayment. That billion sure would look good. But Medicaid expansion is the devil!!
In MS, the hospitals have to file for a certificate of medical necessity. I've heard of two cases in the last 20 years these were denied by state government - Baptist in North MS and St. Dominic in Madison. This is something I would like to understand.
That was true in March when we put off elective procedures and there were no cover cases. But that's not true now. My entire family is in health care - 4 nurses. They're working their asses off. They can get as many shifts as they want right now. It's wide open. My eldest has worked 29 of 31 days.
It's a real problem, but you are correct that it's more of a staffing problem than a facility problem.
According to this, by not expanding Medicaid, over 10 years, we’re “saving” $1,000,000,000 of state expenditures, but turning down $21,000,000,000 of Federal aid.
https://www.urban.org/sites/default...-Result-of-States-Not-Expanding-Medicaid-.PDF
https://www.urban.org/sites/default...-Result-of-States-Not-Expanding-Medicaid-.PDF
It was an attempt to fight every step toward implementing Obamacare. Every official knows that it's easier to campaign to stop something in its tracks than it is to campaign to take something away. I am no expert but everyone in my nuclear family is in medicine, votes Republican down the ticket, and says not taking that money was a huge mistake politically. Obamacare ain't getting repealed any time soon. Republicans had the House, Senate, and Presidency and still couldn't even repeal it.
That's a fairly broad generic statement.
Can you name a specific hospital that has "run out of ICU space?"
If so, then can you provide evidence to demonstrate that specific hospital has run out of ICU space?
Accepting federal aid potentially was a drain on state government funds in the future (that Obamacare money came with “strings attached”), and that’s why some states said “no thanks”. In other states such as Mississippi, it was probably a pure political move. Mississippi is by and large a welfare state that suckles the hind teat of Washington D.C. It was a mistake to turn the federal health care aid down. Mississippi gladly has its hand out for every other form of federal tax payers’ funds.
Last edited:
ICU availability is always fluid, but it's been packed where I work for the past few months. We've been on diversion forever and went into surge capacity 2 weeks ago. We don't have the best healthcare infrastructure in Mississippi on a good day, so dumping Covid on top of that is challenging. It's not unusual for hospitals around here to be on diversion at baseline. because we just don't have a lot of extra beds in Mississippi. 35% of the ICU capacity where I work is Covid, so we would be in a bind if we hadn't stopped doing elective procedures a few weeks ago.
You can get a regular bed on the floor. That's not a big problem. We're busy as always, but you can find space and nurses on the floor. The real issue is the ICU because you've got to have an RN that can take care of an ICU patient. It does worry me because we've been regularly having 1000-1600 cases per day, and many hospitalizations lag. I've noticed it can take 1-2 weeks for some people to get sick enough to need hospitalization.
You can get a regular bed on the floor. That's not a big problem. We're busy as always, but you can find space and nurses on the floor. The real issue is the ICU because you've got to have an RN that can take care of an ICU patient. It does worry me because we've been regularly having 1000-1600 cases per day, and many hospitalizations lag. I've noticed it can take 1-2 weeks for some people to get sick enough to need hospitalization.
I'm hoping flu season isn't as bad because of all the precautions people are taking. Wearing masks, smaller crowds, ect.
The St.D in Madison was a complete joke. Dumb ***** Mary wanted to control Everything and tried to pull a quick one with St. D. just so she would have another tax base.
Rooms aren't needed because because Madison county & the State built the new Madison Oaks hospital due to contracts & promises to Nissan when Madison county closed the old hospital in Canton. Was in agreement signed with Nissan. The State put up money for the new "FOR PROFIT" hospital and that's why it's so close to the Nissan plant.
The City of Madison doesn't need hospital beds for normal daily useage...
I can't speak for ICU beds but I know when I had to take my mom to the ER this past Monday OCH has no ER beds available. People were taken to triage for assessment and then sent back to the waiting room until a bed opened up. As soon as someone was discharged it was like a nascar pit crew getting the room changed over ready for the next person.
Ask any MS hospital administrator about Tater if you want to get an earful and some enlightenment. I see some posters on this thread know exactly what would be said.
It is a Certificate of Need often called a CON. St. Dominic actually at that time, had approved rooms for the Lakeland Campus that it wanted to reallocate to the Madison campus, in essence no new capacity. The Department of Health declined their request and it went to the Supreme Court. Most of the Hospitals in the Metro area are licensed for rooms that they have mothballed, i.e. shut down or turned into offices. It's a complex situation for the Hospitals, trying to balance the need for care with red tape, staffing and unforeseen realities of COVID.
Hospital admins tell you half the story....
....and leave a lot of details out of what is actually going on.
I’m not going to argue pro and anti Medicaid expansion, but I highly doubt that expanding Medicaid would have done anything to expand bed capacity at Mississippi hospitals. Obamacare is primarily built around keeping people out of hospitals by keeping them healthy through yearly exams and other preventive measures. The financial reward for healthcare providers is not putting someone in the hospital bed for days on end, it’s getting them out and keeping them out. This model is problematic for Mississippi because we have unhealthy population who is not educated to do the simple things (yearly exam, healthy eating, exercising , etc), coupled with our rural state and lack of robust healthcare infrastructure. Again, can argue the pros and cons of Medicaid expansion, but it wouldn’t have built new, in-person hospital capacity to handle a pandemic.
A previous poster mentioned the MS Hospital Association’s “MS Cares” plan. All that was is a glorified insurance plan. That plan called for the Legislature to expand Medicaid, and for every new person that would be eligible would automatically be rolled into the MS Cares plan, which is a managed care plan the hospital association would run. That would be a no bid, Legislative mandates contract. The state would then pay the plan X amount per year per person to manage the health of that population. It’s what Mississippi (and most other states) do with their current Medicaid population, except the contracts for the managed care plans are bid. MS Hospital Association tried to bid the last round, but their bid was a joke and did not have financial solvency needed to be properly run. So they lost and then wanted the Legislature to mandate they be given the contract. Should they have gotten the contract, they would do everything to keep people out of hospitals too because it would hurt their bottom lines. They would then make investments into the cash cow of out of patient care, not in person.
I’m not saying it’s right or wrong to expand Medicaid and also acknowledge we have many needs to improve our healthcare infrastructure, but I’m leery of what hospital administrators “claim” on this topic, especially anything coming from MHA.
....and leave a lot of details out of what is actually going on.
I’m not going to argue pro and anti Medicaid expansion, but I highly doubt that expanding Medicaid would have done anything to expand bed capacity at Mississippi hospitals. Obamacare is primarily built around keeping people out of hospitals by keeping them healthy through yearly exams and other preventive measures. The financial reward for healthcare providers is not putting someone in the hospital bed for days on end, it’s getting them out and keeping them out. This model is problematic for Mississippi because we have unhealthy population who is not educated to do the simple things (yearly exam, healthy eating, exercising , etc), coupled with our rural state and lack of robust healthcare infrastructure. Again, can argue the pros and cons of Medicaid expansion, but it wouldn’t have built new, in-person hospital capacity to handle a pandemic.
A previous poster mentioned the MS Hospital Association’s “MS Cares” plan. All that was is a glorified insurance plan. That plan called for the Legislature to expand Medicaid, and for every new person that would be eligible would automatically be rolled into the MS Cares plan, which is a managed care plan the hospital association would run. That would be a no bid, Legislative mandates contract. The state would then pay the plan X amount per year per person to manage the health of that population. It’s what Mississippi (and most other states) do with their current Medicaid population, except the contracts for the managed care plans are bid. MS Hospital Association tried to bid the last round, but their bid was a joke and did not have financial solvency needed to be properly run. So they lost and then wanted the Legislature to mandate they be given the contract. Should they have gotten the contract, they would do everything to keep people out of hospitals too because it would hurt their bottom lines. They would then make investments into the cash cow of out of patient care, not in person.
I’m not saying it’s right or wrong to expand Medicaid and also acknowledge we have many needs to improve our healthcare infrastructure, but I’m leery of what hospital administrators “claim” on this topic, especially anything coming from MHA.
Last edited: