by Lin McNulty
PUBLIC INPUT REQUESTED
On March 18, Cascade Valley Hospitals and Clinics, Island Hospital, and Skagit Regional Health, working together to further their unified mission of providing high-quality healthcare to the North Puget Sound region released a Request for Proposal (RFP) for Affiliation Assistance and Support (full text HERE).
In a move to enhance patient care, improve market stability and seek other ways to work together, last Fall officials of Cascade Valley, Island and Skagit Valley hospitals signed an interlocal agreement to work collaboratively while preserving each hospital’s independence, local identity and autonomy.
A merger, which would combine the three organizations operationally, is not being pursued.
Healthcare organizations are facing challenging times with distressed national and state economies, lower reimbursement for services, and large systems eyeing market areas served by the three hospitals. This agreement is seen as a way to gain strength in the four counties served by the districts—Skagit, Snohomish, Island, and San Juan. Furthermore, pending healthcare reform legislation, state budget cuts, uncompensated care and an aging population are exerting pressure on already challenging hospital revenues.
As a collective group, they issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) to seek a tertiary system partner that will support them in enhancing and expanding patient care access, quality, and efficiency in the region.
“We believe that this agreement allows us to solidify and even grow our market presence while maintaining each of our unique identities,” said Island Hospital Chief Executive Officer Vince Oliver. “This is truly a win-win for our hospitals and the communities served by these excellent hospitals. This collaboration presents great opportunities for enhanced services, quality initiatives and more.”
Although the interlocals (the hospitals) issued one RFP and will select the same partner, they will individually negotiate the specific terms of their respective integration relations with the mutually-accepted partner, and will sign/finalize their partnership agreements at the same time.
Construct of the RFP included:
- Service Integration and Enhancement
- Management and Governance
- Financial Performance
- Questions Addressed to Potential Partners
- Clinical Excellence
- Local and Regional Services
- Physician Recruitment and Alignment
- Support Services
- Information Systems
- Financial Resources and Revenue Enhancement
- Commitments to Employees
- Experience
- Access Regardless of Ability to Pay
- Religious Issues (if applicable)
Responses have been received from four systems—PeaceHealth, Providence-Swedish, UW Medicine and Virginia Mason Medical Center. Full text of each of the responses are available for viewing by clicking the link. UW Medicine and Virginia Mason Medical Center are secular organizations, while PeaceHealth and Providence-Swedish are Catholic.
Among the specifics the interlocals inquire about in the RFP is “Religious Issues,” illustrating a concern for reproductive health care and end-of-life decisions.
RELIGIOUS ISSUES (if applicable)
- Please describe your position regarding when policies implementing Ethical and Religious Directives (ERDs) apply to affiliate secular organizations. What ERD-related policies are implemented in your secular organizations?
- How will you work with the community to ensure there is adequate knowledge regarding policies? Provide relevant examples of how you are addressing these issues in current/recent affiliations.
- Is there a secular option in your organization? What does that mean? Elaborate further on any current secular arrangements or options that would be available to the Interlocals.
Responses include:
PEACEHEALTH: PeaceHealth enjoys an extremely rare sponsorship relationship with the Catholic Church in which none of PeaceHealth’s hospitals are ecclesiastical property, and in which the patient-provider relationship is considered “sacred.” PeaceHealth actively support patients’ wishes as documented in their Advanced Directives….In addition we are currently developing a new capability to enable new affiliates to have an opportunity to affiliate with PeaceHealth either under Catholic Sponsorship or under a new corporation that is non-sponsored.
PROVIDENCE-SWEDISH: Swedish is currently and will always be a secular entity that is not subject to the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, except that no elective abortions, physician assisted suicide, euthanasia or intentional embryonic destruction can be performed in any affiliated facility.
UW: Not applicable.
VIRGINIA MASON: We are a secular organization so this section is not applicable.
Public input is still being accepted. At a recent public forum hosted by Island Hospital in Anacortes on April 30, 25 attendees spoke, 24 of which were not in favor of a Catholic affiliation.
Oral presentations from the respondents are being heard May 20-24, but are not open to the public. A definite date has not yet been set for selecting the new partner.
For those wishing to have input on this issue, names and email addresses for Island Hospital Board Members are available HERE.
I’m sure many of us have opinions we’d like to offer on this issue. However, this write-up is so buried in bureaucratic gobbledy-gook that I can’t understand most of it, let alone make an intelligent comment.
Please, let us have a description of the issues understandable by normal mortals!
I thought Island Hospital was owned by Skagit County. How does the question whether to offer services following either secular or Catholic doctrine get to be an issue for a tax supported local government entity? Lin, you usually make more sense than one can glean from this report. It sounds like an important issue which one can assume is Island Hospital’s effort to stay afloat but the information here is very muddled.
I think your article covers the issues clearly, but it is technical. It is a complicated topic, that could be simplified so that people are not alienated from the process. It seems to me that you want people to be aware that if these 3 independent but allied hospitals choose to partner with Peace Health or Providence then our rights to assisted suicide and abortion could be limited. Swedish has in one sentence denied that but then clearly stated your (and my) concern:
Swedish is currently and will always be a secular entity that is not subject to the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services, except that no elective abortions, physician assisted suicide, euthanasia or intentional embryonic destruction can be performed in any affiliated facility.
My other concern is that the public is being locked out of the oral presentations. Peace Health needs to be pinned down and forced to make a clear statement as Swedish did after the comma, so that we know what to expect from a partnership.
And, we the people should be allowed to hear it.