Supervised training for nurses and staff in specialized areas. Telemedicine programs. Marketing tools and community outreach. Preparation for facility surveys and compliance reviews. Help with physician recruitment.
Those are a few of the services Hospital Corporation of America (HCA) provides as part of its management contract for Allen County Regional Hospital, CEO Tony Thompson last week told a task force thats studying whether to renew its contract with the company. ACRH Board of Trustees heard a brief recap of the presentation at their monthly meeting Tuesday.
The information will be used to help members determine which services are most in demand and what they expect of other management companies when they ask for proposals later this summer or early fall.
The task force had asked Thompson and administrative staff, including Chief Nursing Officer Patty Mc-Guffin, for a summary of all the services HCA provides.
HCA pays the salaries for three top administrative positions: Thompson, McGuffin and Chief Financial Officer Larry Peterson. The company, the largest of its kind in the United States, uses its buying power to negotiate contracts on the hospitals behalf and helps with the credentialing of medical staff.
Task force members said they planned to compile a list of priorities theyd like to see from hospital management companies.
SOME OF the highlights from the June 20 presentation:
Special training.
Some specialized nursing positions require a qualified nurse to observe a trainees performance before certification, but ACRH staff dont always have time, McGuffin said. For example, a nurse who wanted to qualify to administer chemotherapy drugs was trained at HCAs Sarah Cannon Cancer Institute at Overland Park. New nurses in the labor and delivery unit train at Overland Park Regional Medical Center to make sure everyone is taught the same protocol, McGuffin said.
Other than employee time and travel expenses, ACRH doesnt pay anything extra for that training, Thompson said.
Compliance.
Health care comes with an abundance of red tape, so HCA provides software and support to help staff navigate through bureaucracy, Thompson said. That includes access to a library of policies and procedures that can be customized to fit ACRHs needs, technology support to meet electronic record mandates, and preparation for compliance reviews and facility inspections. For example, HCA provided a mock surveyor to inspect the facilities and found issues that needed to be addressed before ACRH faced joint commission review last year, Thompson said.
HCA also has experts who can stay on top of the latest changes to complicated programs like Medicare.
Community outreach and telemedicine.
Telemedicine programs can allow physicians to check in with patients using electronic means and video. For example, plans call for a tele-NICU program that would allow a physician to monitor a high-risk pregnancy from afar and better develop a relationship between the patient and physician before delivery, and a program that would allow patients to consult with cardiologists outside of the twice-a-week clinic hours.
HCA offers a network of community outreach liaisons to visit area clinics, other health professionals and agencies to help ACRH develop those relationships, Thompson said.
HCA also provides experts also teach a monthly Lunch and Learn program to educate people in the community about various health topics.
Theyre filling in blanks to keep patients in this community, Thompson said.
THOMPSON will complete his presentation at 11:30 a.m. July 11 at ACRH. The second half of his report will focus on how the services compare to ACRHs strategic plan and also will take a look at market share reports to see who uses the services. The task force will meet at 11:30 a.m. July 18 to sort through the information and determine priorities for when they send the contract out for bids.
