The division chairs at State College of New York (SUNY) Downstate Faculty of Medication and College Hospital on Wednesday stated they have been extraordinarily involved a few proposal by Gov. Kathy Hochul to “rework” the most important hospital within the epicenter of the Caribbean group in Brooklyn.
“It’s with excessive concern that the division chairs on the SUNY Downstate Faculty of Medication have realized of the SUNY proposal to remodel College Hospital at Downstate (UHD) right into a facility with none inpatient providers,” stated the chairs in a joint assertion.
“Assurances that this can enhance the care acquired by the residents of central Brooklyn, that the Faculty of Medication’s academic mission will probably be unaffected, and that the residency and fellowship applications sponsored by the establishment will have the ability to proceed their position in coaching physicians who in giant numbers stay in New York Metropolis and New York State, show to us of an absence of appreciation of the character, scope, and far-reaching influence of our medical operation in central Brooklyn, and our mission for educating, coaching and creating our healthcare workforce,” they added.
“Relatively, we consider that these important features of Downstate will probably be drastically compromised,” the chairs continued. “Even the announcement itself was a disruptive and destabilizing drive, with fast, far-reaching repercussions on college students and trainees, contemplating whether or not to launch or proceed their careers at Downstate.”
The chairs comprise: Cynthia L Benson, DO, MPH, MBA, director of high quality, Emergency Division, interim medical director, Emergency Division, interim chair, Emergency Division; Sydney C. Butts, MD, FACS, interim chair and affiliate professor, chief-facial plastic and reconstructive surgical procedure, Division of Otolaryngology; Camille A. Clare, MD, MPH, CPE, FACOG, chair, Division of Obstetrics and Gynecology; and Sharon A. Glick, MD, MS, Chair, Division of Dermatology, Program Director, Division of Dermatology.
Others are: Panogiotis Kougias, MD, MSc., chair, Division of Surgical procedure, chief, Division of Vascular Surgical procedure; Jenny Libien, MD, Ph. D, chair of pathology; Deborah L. Reede, professor and chair, Division of Radiology; Christopher Román, Ph. D, affiliate professor and chair, Division of Cell Biology; Daniel M. Rosenbaum, MD, Distinguished Service professor and chair, Division of Neurology; Moro Salifu, MD, MBA, MPH, MACP, chair, Division of Medication; and Roman Shinder, MD, FACS, interim chairman of Ophthalmology, director of Oculoplastics.
Different chairs: Ramaswamy Viswanathan, MD, DrMedSc., professor and interim chair, Division of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Senator, SUNY School Senate, president-elect, American Psychiatric Affiliation; Stephen Wadowski, MD, professor and chairman, Division of Pediatrics; Jeffrey P. Weiss, MD, Ph. D, FACS, professor and chair, Division of Urology, director, MD-PhD Program, Faculty of Graduate Research; David Wlody, MD, chair, Division of Anesthesiology; and Robert Okay. S. Wong, Ph. D, distinguished professor and chair, Physiology and Pharmacology.
“We’re involved that the core missions of Downstate — to handle well being care disparities that disproportionately have an effect on our group in central Brooklyn, and to diversify the well being care workforce—threaten to be undermined by this transformation,” the chairs stated. “We want to make it clear that we’re dedicated to working with SUNY to handle the very actual points affecting UHD. Nonetheless, we urge Gov. Hochul and SUNY to rethink this proposal in its current kind, and to offer the assist UHD requires to proceed its a number of, critically vital missions.”
The chairs stated they refute SUNY’s competition that UHD loses as much as $100 million per yr “as a part of a justification for this transformation.”
“It’s plain that the hospital has sustained important losses since 2019. That is more likely to have been a transient occasion, nevertheless, largely as a result of designation of UHD as a COVID-only hospital, whereas being denied the mandatory assist to function beneath that designation,” they stated.
“Even after this designation was eliminated, there remained a major drop in our census, largely resulting from a notion in the neighborhood that we remained a COVID-only facility, and the flight of group practitioners that beforehand referred sufferers to us,” they added. “Because of the efforts of hospital management, our medical workers, and our nursing colleagues, it’s anticipated that UHD will strategy break-even for the present fiscal yr.”
The chairs stated that is important compared with the losses sustained by neighboring hospitals in Brooklyn.
For instance, they stated the Well being and Hospital (H+H) system receives assist from New York Metropolis on the order of $2.9 billion. Maimonides Medical Middle most just lately posted a lack of $147 million, and in 2023, the One Brooklyn Well being system acquired a subsidy of higher than $400 million.
“And with the upcoming finish to our unfavorable lease on the Bay Ridge facility, we anticipate an additional enchancment within the backside line,” the chairs stated.
Additionally they refuted SUNY’s evaluation of the hospital’s bodily plant as being past restore and its estimate {that a} new hospital might value $3-4 billion, saying that each factors are “questionable.”
The chairs stated quite a few enhancements have been made with the aim of addressing admittedly important points, if due solely to the age of the power: a brand new interventional radiology facility, new CT scanners, substitute of all home windows within the facility, and segregation of {the electrical} system.
“It’s removed from apparent that the power is past restore,” they stated. “The price of constructing a wholly new facility, which, in fact, could be a long-term resolution, is very unlikely to value as a lot as has been estimated; the brand new H+H Ruth Bader Ginsberg Hospital, previously Coney Island Hospital, a state-of-the-art 350 mattress facility, value $923 million. We really feel that every one choices for enhancing the power be thought-about.”
The chairs stated they can not overstate the numerous opposed impact of the governor’s proposal on the sufferers that the hospital serves within the central Brooklyn group.
“It’s inaccurate to say that our day by day census represents a fraction of our mattress capability,” they stated. “It has been acknowledged that UHD has over 300 beds with a mean day by day census of solely 150, the implication being that we’re solely half full.
“Nonetheless, the variety of initially licensed beds bears no relationship to the precise present variety of staffed beds; we’re staffed for the variety of beds which are occupied, the 350-bed determine being fully theoretical,” they added. “Every day, we’ve got a ample variety of inpatients that the admission of sufferers from our Emergency Division is usually delayed.”
The chairs stated the impact on each undergraduate and graduate medical schooling will probably be “devastating”, with the “transformation” of the hospital.
“We’ve got been assured that the Faculty of Medication will probably be unaffected by the proposed restructuring of UHD. Provided that our college students spend as much as 30 p.c of their medical rotations at UHD, this assertion appears extremely unlikely,” they stated. “We’re at distinct drawback when making an attempt to put our college students at neighboring affiliate hospitals, largely as a result of outsized footprint of offshore medical colleges, which might afford to pay hospitals important sums, as much as $50,000 per yr per pupil, to acquire medical rotations.
“Supervising physicians at native associates don’t at all times have the identical dedication to schooling that our personal physicians have; and, in reality, many native hospitals have particularly excluded schooling from their mission statements,” they added.
The chairs consider that there must be a “central Brooklyn-focused resolution” to the issues of healthcare in Kings County.
“There’s, undoubtedly, redundancy of care in a number of hospitals throughout the borough,” they stated. “A rational evaluation of those providers must be made, with the objective of regionalizing well being care. SUNY-Downstate ought to take a number one position on this regional re-visioning of well being care, serving as the educational heart for hospitals that we are able to associate with.”
The chairs stated there’s “an pressing want” for the development of a state-of-the-art ambulatory care heart, containing the complete vary of diagnostic and therapeutic capabilities, encompassing each main and specialty care, in addition to ambulatory surgical and procedural capabilities.
They stated this heart ought to deal with the precise wants of the group and may have a “laser focus” on addressing disparities and inequities in well being care.
The chairs stated it’s important that an inpatient footprint be maintained throughout the present system.
They stated, whereas this will likely in reality result in a lower within the variety of beds, “these beds ought to be devoted to the extremely specialised care finest offered by a tertiary care establishment, once more, in coordination with different hospitals in central Brooklyn.”
The chairs at Downstate stated they’ve spent their complete careers on the establishment, have seen the “great worth” of the care they supply, and “strongly worth” their connection to the central Brooklyn group and the various weak sufferers they handle.
“We look ahead to working with SUNY to make sure that we are able to proceed to offer this care,” they stated.
On Tuesday, State Sen. Zellnor Y. Myrie stated he was “happy” with the large turn-out final Thursday’s rally to avoid wasting the hospital from closing.
“Final Thursday, we rallied as a group in opposition to the governor’s proposal to shutter SUNY Downstate Hospital. Regardless of the frigid temperatures, over 1200 healthcare staff and group members stood collectively, and the vitality and keenness have been felt by all,” stated Myrie, who represents the 20th Senate District that encompasses Downstate Hospital, in a message to constituents.
“I used to be happy to see so a lot of you be a part of us on the rally,” added Myrie, who has been within the vanguard to maintain the doorways of the hospital open. “The message has been and continues to be clear: this group opposes any plan to cut back healthcare entry the place it’s wanted most in Central Brooklyn.
“I used to be proud to face alongside so many religion and labor leaders, docs, nurses, and anxious neighbors who stand in robust opposition to this plan,” continued Myrie, whose grandmother hailed from Jamaica. “In truth, new polling launched immediately confirms that Central Brooklyn is overwhelmingly in opposition to the governor and SUNY’s Downstate proposal.”
On the rally, in entrance of the hospital on Clarkson Avenue in Brooklyn, Myrie was specific that he’ll proceed to battle valiantly to avoid wasting Downstate Hospital.
“Take into consideration the infants who will probably be born only a few steps from us. Take into consideration the long run we’re defending,” he stated. “If we’ve got to carry 10 extra rallies, we’ll.
“What extra do we’ve got to sacrifice?” Myrie requested. “We deserve higher.”
Amid chants of “Brooklyn wants Downstate”, United College Professions (UUP) President Fred Kowal, whose union represents nearly all of staff at Downstate, stated: “We’re right here for one purpose and one purpose alone, and that’s as a result of Brooklyn wants Downstate.
“We is not going to let Downstate shut,” he stated. “Not immediately, not tomorrow, not ever.”
Kowal additional warned that if Gov. Hochul pursues her plan “to shut this place of therapeutic, she will probably be locking out Black moms and Black infants,” including: “That’s mistaken.”
Civil proper activist the Rev. Al Sharpton additionally spoke on the rally, telling demonstrators: “We don’t have a lot alternative in Brooklyn, so we select to battle.
“If we don’t do our obligation, folks will endure,” he additionally cautioned.
Later, State Assemblyman Brian Cunningham, who additionally represents Downstate and the encircling communities, instructed Caribbean Life that he remained “steadfast in my dedication to preserving Downstate Medical Middle, a lifeline for hundreds of low-income folks of colour in District 43.”
Cunningham, whose mom hails from Jamaica, stated whereas the just lately introduced funding of $200 million to cowl two years of working prices and $300 million for future infrastructure enhancements “seems promising on the floor, this funding is meaningless with out enter from the area people.
“I’m outraged by the state management’s refusal for actual engagement with residents, healthcare staff, and native leaders,” he stated. “Infrastructure funding can’t be allowed to maneuver ahead with out enter from those that know our group’s wants finest.
“I additionally refuse to view funding to maintain the lights on as something greater than the naked minimal,” he added. “That cash just isn’t charity, neither is it undeserved; it’s important, and our group has earned it.”
Cunningham famous that earlier final week he launched one other piece of laws, which calls on Gov. Hochul and SUNY management to create a Neighborhood Advisory Board “that may play an energetic position in funding selections for Downstate.
“The board should signify the demographics of this traditionally Black and working-class neighborhood and embody sufferers, healthcare staff, clergy, and native authorities leaders who reside within the surrounding group,” the assemblyman stated. “A metamorphosis plan that’s not knowledgeable by the wants of our group is an affront to racial and financial justice and an insult to the folks of Central Brooklyn.”
