One year ago this week Mercy Hospital in Fort Scott dropped a bombshell, announcing that after 132 years it would close its doors.
Some say the hospitals demise began almost as soon as its new construction was completed in 2002.
We were naïve, said Dave Martin, Fort Scott city manager, as to the changing landscape of healthcare.
With the hospitals closure, workarounds with an outpatient clinic and emergency room ensure residents continue to receive healthcare, though on a smaller scale.
Such scenarios may be the future for much of rural Kansas, predicts Reta Baker, the former CEO of Mercy.
Hospitals are not the heart of healthcare in the community any longer, Baker wrote in an email to the Register Thursday. Baker is now on staff with the Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas as its vice president of clinical education.
Reta Baker
By necessity, hospitals are changing to become hubs of healthcare in terms of offering outpatient services for therapies and surgeries and where visiting specialists have office hours.
TODAY, any hopes the Fort Scott hospital may reopen in some form have been quashed with the news it is to be demolished.
Though Martin said Thursday, I will neither confirm nor deny the news, those operating a clinic and emergency room in the abandoned hospital confirmed they are aware of the situation.
Krista Postai, executive director of CHC/SEK, which up an outpatient clinic in the abandoned hospital, said Thursday, We have a two-year lease with Mercy with the understanding that the building will not be available past then.
Krista Postai, executive director of the Pittsburg-based Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas, and Jason Wesco, vice president of CHC/SEK, are in the Iola clinic lobby. CHC/SEK has clinics in 15 communities, including Iola.
