Hospitals
July 28, 2016 at 4:25 p.m.
By -
The Parkview Warsaw facility is slated to open fall of 2015. Once again, Warsaw will test having two medical facilities. Many comments about their new facility are floating around. A couple of them I would like to comment about having attended the July 2014 plan commission meeting. I believe it will give a more accurate picture of what is to come.
One comment heard is this facility will be a hospital. The 30 to 40 beds it is to have making it a hospital will be added later. This means it cannot admit patients. So anyone who goes to this facility needing an overnight stay will be sent to Columbia City or Fort Wayne. If you need an ambulance transfer, you will have another fee to pay. Ambulance fees are not cheap. Calling it a hospital is premature. It will be an outpatient center with an ER.
Another comment being made is it will be a trauma center just like Columbia City’s facility is. It might be better to state that it will be able to handle some basic levels of trauma, but it is no trauma center. The only true trauma centers for this area are in South Bend and Fort Wayne, however, an outpatient center with an ER not capable of admitting patients doesn’t suggest a strong capability of handling much trauma. Even with 30 to 40 beds being added doesn’t suggest a strong capability of handling much trauma. It suggests a basic facility with basic services. This town knows from past history what this is about.
Sources familiar with the Columbia City facility reinforce this. According to them, it is nice and new but very small. It has a tiny ER, only four ICU beds and a couple of surgical suites. All serious emergencies and surgeries go to Fort Wayne. In fact, they apparently only do scheduled surgeries. They refer to it as the way station. They prefer coming to KCH or going to Lutheran. Apparently, they did not get what they thought they were to get in buyout.
At the July 2014 plan commission meeting, pictures of the Parkview facility were presented. It was stated the project would be done in phases. The adding of beds will come later along with a helipad. The facility will be built so as to appear bigger than it is, just like the Columbia City facility, long and narrow. The pictures were impressive but a 30- to 40-bed hospital is not much of a commitment to advance services. A fairer comparison would be to state that it will be smaller than the former Murphy Hospital when completed and offering only a little more.
Now I know differing opinions about the Columbia City facility can be found. It might be a good place to start if I lived there. But living here, further away from Fort Wayne, it makes better sense to start with the most advanced facility locally. When comparing facility, doctors, equipment and services, KCH offers so much more. Once again it doesn’t claim to be perfect but strives toward improvement.
Considering all this I ask some important questions. Do we realize just what we do have? Is this a step in the right direction? We have come a long way improving healthcare in this community over the past 40 years. Do we want to repeat history? What we once lacked, doctors, services, equipment and facility, we now have. Why would I want to take less? KCH offers much to be grateful for.
Steve Lawlor
Warsaw[[In-content Ad]]
The Parkview Warsaw facility is slated to open fall of 2015. Once again, Warsaw will test having two medical facilities. Many comments about their new facility are floating around. A couple of them I would like to comment about having attended the July 2014 plan commission meeting. I believe it will give a more accurate picture of what is to come.
One comment heard is this facility will be a hospital. The 30 to 40 beds it is to have making it a hospital will be added later. This means it cannot admit patients. So anyone who goes to this facility needing an overnight stay will be sent to Columbia City or Fort Wayne. If you need an ambulance transfer, you will have another fee to pay. Ambulance fees are not cheap. Calling it a hospital is premature. It will be an outpatient center with an ER.
Another comment being made is it will be a trauma center just like Columbia City’s facility is. It might be better to state that it will be able to handle some basic levels of trauma, but it is no trauma center. The only true trauma centers for this area are in South Bend and Fort Wayne, however, an outpatient center with an ER not capable of admitting patients doesn’t suggest a strong capability of handling much trauma. Even with 30 to 40 beds being added doesn’t suggest a strong capability of handling much trauma. It suggests a basic facility with basic services. This town knows from past history what this is about.
Sources familiar with the Columbia City facility reinforce this. According to them, it is nice and new but very small. It has a tiny ER, only four ICU beds and a couple of surgical suites. All serious emergencies and surgeries go to Fort Wayne. In fact, they apparently only do scheduled surgeries. They refer to it as the way station. They prefer coming to KCH or going to Lutheran. Apparently, they did not get what they thought they were to get in buyout.
At the July 2014 plan commission meeting, pictures of the Parkview facility were presented. It was stated the project would be done in phases. The adding of beds will come later along with a helipad. The facility will be built so as to appear bigger than it is, just like the Columbia City facility, long and narrow. The pictures were impressive but a 30- to 40-bed hospital is not much of a commitment to advance services. A fairer comparison would be to state that it will be smaller than the former Murphy Hospital when completed and offering only a little more.
Now I know differing opinions about the Columbia City facility can be found. It might be a good place to start if I lived there. But living here, further away from Fort Wayne, it makes better sense to start with the most advanced facility locally. When comparing facility, doctors, equipment and services, KCH offers so much more. Once again it doesn’t claim to be perfect but strives toward improvement.
Considering all this I ask some important questions. Do we realize just what we do have? Is this a step in the right direction? We have come a long way improving healthcare in this community over the past 40 years. Do we want to repeat history? What we once lacked, doctors, services, equipment and facility, we now have. Why would I want to take less? KCH offers much to be grateful for.
Steve Lawlor
Warsaw[[In-content Ad]]
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