Dr. Stephen Shroering

At Lehigh Regional Medical Center in Lehigh Acres, admissions and surgeries are significantly lower than preceding years, but this parallels the rest of the country. Almost two-thirds or recently surveyed hospitals are reporting the same information with dwindling admissions, less surgery and significant increases in non-paying patients.

People with and without insurance try to avoid hospitalization because of the financial burden it places on the individual or family. When their illness

reaches a crisis level, they then come to the hospital where they are much more ill and much more difficult (and therefore much more expensive) to treat.

This drains hospitals of financial resources that are critical for their survivability.

Florida hospitals are particularly dependent on Medicare reimbursement because of the elderly population.

Medicare, year after year, continues to cut reimbursement to hospitals and physicians. Hospitals and physicians try running faster to remain profitable, but you can only run so fast before you are exhausted and “spent.”

Matters are no better with private insurance companies. In fact, there are private insurance companies that pay physicians and hospitals lower than Medicare rates and at the same time, turn around and charge their patients higher deductibles, which in turn shifts a higher cost to patients. This in turn makes it more difficult for these patients to pay for their healthcare.

So what can be done?

How does a community invest in its healthcare security for the future? There is much to be done and the problem is not easily remedied. As a community, we must realize the importance of having close, easily accessible, quality healthcare that is safe and meets the community’s needs.

Many illnesses and injuries demand immediate attention. To have to travel, even in a speeding ambulance, for 20 to 30 minutes or longer can mean the difference between life and death. Our community deserves excellent, expeditious, safe and dependable healthcare.

Lehigh Regional medical Center is owned and operated by Health Management Associates (HMA) whose mission is a commitment to provide quality service and compassionate healthcare and they do so at all 61 of their hospitals.

Being a physician in this community, I have a sensitive ear to the complaints I hear about our hospital and I have to honestly tell you they are the same complaints you hear about at almost any hospital.

There are no hospitals without problems, without errors, without unhappy customers, without complaints, without internal struggles, without suffering, without deaths.

I am extremely proud of our hospital and the healthcare we provide and the physicians that provide it in this community.

I can personally tell you that I could never look a patient in the eye and tell them to come to Lehigh Regional medical Center if I for any moment felt their

care would be inferior to that provided by any other hospital in our area.

We have so much to be proud of. Our hospital has a Wound Care Center that treats complex wounds that is one of the best in Lee County.

We have opened a new Joint Academy, which is a special unit in the hospital for the treatment of patients with total hip and knee replacement. The patients in this unit never leave their unit for anything. All care is provided in the unit including physical therapy. The nursing staff has all been specially trained for this unit and has a vast background in the treatment of these types of surgeries.

The meals are all served buffet style and family members are welcomed and encouraged to come to assist in the rehabilitation of their family member and

even share a meal. This unit has been designed to give the ambiance of a high quality hotel rather than a hospital, as these are not sick patients, but

patients that are having elective surgeries, which restores their quality of life.

We want to be first in line with their quality restoration.

Lehigh Regional Medical Center has a safe, competent, and courteous nursing staff. Nurses are not subservient to physicians, but instead are highly trained professionals, who make independent, minute-by-minute decisions and work side-by-side with physicians.

We have a compassionate nursing staff that I feel very safe with and have provided care even for me when I was hospitalized. The vast majority of my

patients comment positively about their care at Lehigh Regional.

Our most recent three graduate nurses hired by the hospital were all “A” (4.0) students. We also have a hospital administrator who has made great strides in his short tenure in the last year.

Jose Morillo is an intense community supporter and lives in Lehigh Acres. He has provided a vital leadership to the hospital which has invigorated the

nursing and medical staff.

He has made many wonderful contributions in a very short period of time. To name only a few he has been instrumental in placing a new state of the art

CT scanner and has arranged for a new, higher quality MRI scanner soon to be installed.

He has recruited new highly qualified medical staff in the areas to primary care, radiology, general surgery, gynecology, and pathology. He has seen that our pharmacy and hospital now have a computerized, wireless, medication system in place that minimizes medication errors.

We also have a new Medical Staff president. Dr. Imtiaz Almad.

Dr. Almad is a local pulmonologist who is providing leadership within our medical staff and is profoundly committed to quality safe healthcare. He has united our medical staff, which can stand with the best of any other physicians in our area. We have compassionate, safe, and highly trained physicians with impeccable credentials.

Healthcare industry in state of turmoil

The healthcare industry is in a state of flux, uncertainty and turmoil. Not only are patients concerned about the future of their well-being, but

physicians and hospitals are also apprehensive.

This is not a new dilemma that just now raised its ugly head.

These concerns have been brewing for quite sometime, but with our economic crisis acting as a catalyst, the havoc has greatly accelerated. Hospitals are struggling to keep their doors open and to be able to continue to provide quality healthcare for the communities they serve. One only needs to look at the value of hospital company stocks to see that we are on the edge of great calamity.

There are many issues at hand that are contributing to this chaos.The most significant immediate issue is the economy. More and more people are losing their jobs, which is now occurring at an accelerated rate in hospital systems as they struggle to stay financially stable.

Laying off employees is usually the last resort for hospitals. Hospital management realizes that hospital personnel are critical to the maintenance of a safe and superior healthcare. Nevertheless, in order for hospital companies to conserve and adjust to this crisis they have had to shave their personnel force to minimums.

Southwest Florida has one of the highest unemployment rates in the United States. Some 25 percent (one in four) people in the Southwest Florida area are unemployed.

Unemployment places great financial demands on hospital systems, which are required by federal law to provide care for emergencies to any person

regardless of their means to pay.

As people lose their jobs, they lose their health insurance. This in turn (healthcare without insurance or a means to pay) is one of the leading causes

of bankruptcy in America. Bankruptcy only leads to further financial turmoil and creates a vicious circle of ruin for all involved parties.

And through all this pandemonium, hospital systems are still expected to maintain quality healthcare standards. Quality healthcare is labor intensive,

highly technical and expensive.

If hospitals and physicians cannot remain profitable, they will not be able to purchase the highly technical equipment to provide this type of care or worse

yet, their doors will simply close.

The government and health insurance companies have cut reimbursement to hospitals and physicians to the point where safe quality care is beginning to

be unreachable.

But you only need to look as far as the stock prospectus of many of the nation’s leading insurance companies to see that these companies are

flourishing well and their stock values are on steep inclines.

As the money is squandered from those providing the healthcare they continue to make extraordinary profits.

This is a nation-wide crisis.

It is not something unique to Lehigh Acres or Fort Myers hospitals and physicians all across this country are struggling with the same issues. Some

states have reported that 50 to 100 percent of their hospitals are in severe financial trouble, with some even filing bankruptcy. However, rural and

suburban hospitals are particularly vulnerable to the threat of closure.

Hospitals and physicians simply can’t continue to provide free healthcare and absorb huge bad debts and continue to be expected to provide safe and first-class healthcare.

I find it abhorrent that our government stands by and watches and expects hospitals and physicians to provide all this free care to the detriment of their own ability to survive and not lend a helping hand. We are bailing automakers out while healthcare is going down the drain.

Fixing this dilemma is not the sole responsibility of healthcare providers.

There are many who are responsible to assure that quality care remains accessible to all including: healthcare providers, hospitals, federal and state

government, insurance companies, employers and the communities to name a few.

But we must all realize that high quality healthcare cannot be expected without appropriate financial reimbursement.

Many Americans view healthcare as an entitlement, no different than our sense of entitlement for Social Security, but there are great differences. Social Security is a savings plan that workers in America contribute to throughout their productive years.

There is no governmental savings plan for healthcare.

It has to be paid either out of your own pocket or by third party payers such as insurance companies. The insurance companies and the government however do not want to pay at a reasonable rate even with the knowledge that our system is collapsing and these companies are continuing to make enormous profits. The problems are complex and multi-factorial.

So what can you do as a community?

Simply support your healthcare system. Lehigh Regional medical Center loses as much as 70 percent of the healthcare business that simply bypasses us to Fort Myers. Why is this?

Unfounded and unsubstantiated fear. We have a quality healthcare system in Lehigh, but it can only survive by your support.

Support and trust your local physicians by choosing them for your healthcare and by choosing Lehigh Regional medical Center.

There is no great time nor need than now. If physicians cannot make a reasonable living and the hospital cannot be financially successful, all could

be lost.

The worst may yet be to come, so start now. Let us prove to you how good we are. You won’t be disappointed.

The opinions in this article belong solely to the author. Dr. Stephen P. Schroering, MD PLCC, is a board certified orthopedic surgeon. He has offices at 1328 homestead Rd. in the Publix shopping center. Ed.