Morehead hospital furloughs 300 staff amid COVID-19 outbreak for lack of revenue
St. Claire HealthCare in Morehead said it will furlough a quarter of its staff this week, signaling that not even hospitals are immune to financial hardship amid Kentucky’s blooming COVID-19 outbreak.
Beginning Thursday, SCH will furlough 300 staff “who are not directly involved in the delivery of care or participating in the COVID-19 response,” according to a press release sent to employees and the media late Thursday morning. “This will affect approximately 25 percent of the existing workforce, with some remaining staff experiencing a reduction in worked hours until this crisis subsides.”
The “intent is for these furloughs to be temporary” and for staff to be recalled “as quickly as possible,” SCH President and CEO Donald H. Lloyd, II said, but these are “unprecedented times.” Laying off a quarter of the medical system’s staff is “not a decision we wanted to make nor do we take it lightly, but we have to take immediate action to ensure that we can sustain our clinical operations during and after the COVID-19 crisis ends.”
To date, the hospital system has not seen any patients with diagnosed COVID-19, a spokeswoman said.
Since hospitals and health care providers across Kentucky have had to temporarily suspend elective procedures and surgeries, per a request earlier this month and then codified with an executive order handed down by Gov. Andy Beshear this week, many providers are seeing massive reductions in overall patient visits and, as a result, revenue streams.
More than 224 Kentuckians have so far contracted COVID-19 and at least 3,300 have been tested. Beshear on Wednesday said the state is entering the phase of outbreak where case numbers may start doubling every one or two days as community spread gains momentum, warning, “the surge is coming.”
Hospitals in rural parts of Kentucky are acutely disadvantaged in this outbreak, both in capacity and resources. Many already operate on tight budgets, and notable increases in patient volume could strain hospitals beyond their means, the Herald-Leader reported last week.
St. Claire, one of the largest hospital systems in Eastern Kentucky, halted all elective surgeries, screening diagnostic procedures, outpatient therapy services, sleep lab testing, aesthetic procedures. As a result, over the past 10 days, the system “has experienced a significant decline in patient visits at clinic locations, ambulatory and ancillary locations, and without our medical education operations.”
“Sadly, those numbers are projected to get worse before they get better, and no one knows how long this pandemic will continue,” Lloyd said.
In recent weeks, hospitals and providers have been scrambling to adapt their practices, procedures and stockpile medical supplies, including personal protective equipment, to prepare as best they can for such an influx, as more cases will mean more Kentuckians require hospitalization.
Some of that readying effort has included redistributing staff. Last week, St. Claire temporarily shut down its family medicine Morehead-North location and reassigned two health care providers at that location to work elsewhere in the system, in preparation for a potential influx of COVID-19 patients.
It’s not known how long St. Claire staff will remain furloughed, but those laid off will keep their positions and “will be recalled as needed to respond to a surge” of coronavirus patients, or as state and federal funding becomes available, Lloyd said.
SCH, in the meantime, will cover the costs of medical, dental and vision insurance for those laid off and help with applying for unemployment.
The U.S. House was expected to pass a historically massive $2 trillion COVID-19 stimulus package on Thursday to provide nationwide relief to individuals, businesses and health care institutions, but it’s unclear when that relief, $117 million of which will be dispersed to hospitals, will arrive, Lloyd said.
“At this time, we don’t know if and when that aid will reach our institution,” he said. “We are hopeful assistance will be available soon, but right now, we have to manage our operations with the resources we currently have available.”
This story was originally published March 26, 2020 at 1:06 PM.
