Editors note: On April 19, Becker's Hospital Review received the following statement from Emergency Medicine Physicians in regards to an article regarding St. Rose Dominican Hospitals' decision to end its contact with EMP. The full-length statement reads as follows:
"It has long been Emergency Medicine Physicians' policy to decline comment on public issues related to our partner hospitals. However, since St. Rose and its parent, Dignity Health, have sought to terminate EMP's contract at St. Rose two weeks after an unfavorable article about Community Ambulance, based on unfounded allegations, appeared in the Las Vegas Sun, we offer the following facts for consideration:
Community Ambulance was formed, with the approval of the Henderson City Council, as a private joint venture with St. Rose owning 50%, and the other 50% owned by Dr. Rick Henderson and two other investors. Emergency Medicine Physicians was not involved with the planning or setup of Community Ambulance, has never had a financial interest in Community Ambulance, and has never received a penny for the transfer of St. Rose patients by Community Ambulance or any other ambulance company.
St. Rose developed a transfer program in which emergency room patients who needed to be admitted would be asked to voluntarily agree to be transferred, at the hospital's expense, from the overcrowded St. Rose facility where they were waiting, to a relatively under utilized St. Rose hospital in order that those patients could quickly get into an inpatient bed. Community Ambulance would then transfer patients who agreed. In order to facilitate the program St. Rose employed "transfer coordinators" and requested that EMP physicians ask their admitted emergency room patients if they would agree to be transferred which was the full extent of EMP's involvement with the transfer program.
When St. Rose initiated the transfer program, St. Rose informed EMP that a legal review had been conducted which concluded that the program had been deemed legal as well as compliant with St. Rose's ethical standards. The transfer program, using Community Ambulance, continues to this day, using policies developed by St. Rose and Dignity Health.
Until EMP received an informal contract termination notice on April 16, there was no indication to EMP that St. Rose was dissatisfied with EMP.
On April 17, St. Rose invited, by email, "most, if not all of EMP's local, high-quality emergency physicians and midlevel providers [to] continue working with us at St. Rose."
Those "high-quality and compassionate emergency physicians" who are being invited to remain at St. Rose are all EMP Physician partners, and all of them have participated in the transfer program as the hospital requested.
Inasmuch as the previously mentioned "unfounded allegations" which were published in the newspapers are the subject of pending litigation, in which EMP is confident that such allegations will be demonstrated to be false, EMP is unable to comment more fully at this time."
"It has long been Emergency Medicine Physicians' policy to decline comment on public issues related to our partner hospitals. However, since St. Rose and its parent, Dignity Health, have sought to terminate EMP's contract at St. Rose two weeks after an unfavorable article about Community Ambulance, based on unfounded allegations, appeared in the Las Vegas Sun, we offer the following facts for consideration:
Community Ambulance was formed, with the approval of the Henderson City Council, as a private joint venture with St. Rose owning 50%, and the other 50% owned by Dr. Rick Henderson and two other investors. Emergency Medicine Physicians was not involved with the planning or setup of Community Ambulance, has never had a financial interest in Community Ambulance, and has never received a penny for the transfer of St. Rose patients by Community Ambulance or any other ambulance company.
St. Rose developed a transfer program in which emergency room patients who needed to be admitted would be asked to voluntarily agree to be transferred, at the hospital's expense, from the overcrowded St. Rose facility where they were waiting, to a relatively under utilized St. Rose hospital in order that those patients could quickly get into an inpatient bed. Community Ambulance would then transfer patients who agreed. In order to facilitate the program St. Rose employed "transfer coordinators" and requested that EMP physicians ask their admitted emergency room patients if they would agree to be transferred which was the full extent of EMP's involvement with the transfer program.
When St. Rose initiated the transfer program, St. Rose informed EMP that a legal review had been conducted which concluded that the program had been deemed legal as well as compliant with St. Rose's ethical standards. The transfer program, using Community Ambulance, continues to this day, using policies developed by St. Rose and Dignity Health.
Until EMP received an informal contract termination notice on April 16, there was no indication to EMP that St. Rose was dissatisfied with EMP.
On April 17, St. Rose invited, by email, "most, if not all of EMP's local, high-quality emergency physicians and midlevel providers [to] continue working with us at St. Rose."
Those "high-quality and compassionate emergency physicians" who are being invited to remain at St. Rose are all EMP Physician partners, and all of them have participated in the transfer program as the hospital requested.
Inasmuch as the previously mentioned "unfounded allegations" which were published in the newspapers are the subject of pending litigation, in which EMP is confident that such allegations will be demonstrated to be false, EMP is unable to comment more fully at this time."