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Published: October 3, 2008
On Tuesday, one of the few doctors in the area who serves underinsured patients received a letter from Danville Regional Medical Center informing him that after 14 years, his services were no longer required. Two days later, he officially lost his job.
“I wish I could say I understand it,” Dr. Phillip Hale said Thursday. “It seems to be driven by (the hospital’s) bottom line mentality without really looking at the big picture.”
Hale said Family Healthcare Center on Piney Forest Road where he practiced was losing money and he believes that led to the termination of his contract.
But as one of the only practices in Danville open to Medicaid patients, Hale said he feels it is a necessary community asset.
Most private practices don’t accept Medicaid patients because the payout doctors receive from those patients is “very small,” Hale said.
He said the center could only operate because of the effective subsidy from the hospital.
Danville Regional Medical Center declined to comment on why they decided to fire Hale or whether or not they anticipate any more cutbacks.
“At Danville Regional Medical Center, we value all of our patients and want to assure them they will continue to receive high-quality care at the Family Healthcare Center,” Leslie Smith, director of marketing and community relations for Danville Regional, said in a written response. “Patients will continue to be seen by a physician and nurse practitioner.”
When Danville Regional was a not-for profit hospital, it didn’t seem to have a problem with the arrangement, Hale said. It was after it was sold to LifePoint Hospitals Inc. in 2005, the changes started coming, he said.
“A clerk here, a nurse there,” Hale said.
Hale believes the financial changes didn’t just stop with hirings and firings.
Hale said since he focused on preventative care with most of his Medicaid patients, it wasn’t necessarily a good thing for the hospital’s revenue intake.
“If I took care of their blood pressure and sugar, they wouldn’t be going to the emergency room,” Hale said. “They wouldn’t be getting sick enough to be admitted to the hospital.
“When we do that, the hospital actually loses more money.”
Hale said because so many doctors have recently left the area, he’s pretty sure he’ll be able to find another job. Still, he’s quite dismayed by Danville Regional’s decision.
“I think it goes back to when the decision was made to sell to a for-profit hospital,” Hale said. “The writing was on the wall then.”
Contact Sarah Arkin at or (434) 791-7983.
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Reader Reactions
Nowhere in this article does it state what the doctor is earning. I can assure you his services are not for free. So, someone is paying the bill. If the patients are primarily Medicaid patients, who pay nothing for the care they receive, then we the taxpayers are paying it. I think closing the “free clinic” may not be a bad idea. Of course, were the doctor to work for free, then maybe the clinic could stay open.
Don’t come to Eden Bubba, got eleven shots for rabies…bill was $4600.00…greedy does not even come close….criminal is more accurate.
ok im sorry, but i STRUGGLE to keep my family afloat because we make too much.. HA! THATS A JOKE! THESE PEOPLE WHO GET FOOD STAMPS AND GET their nails done and drive nice cars are the ones that make medical assistance look bad. Medicaid needs to be screened just a little more closely and not handed to every person who walks in off the street! Its not right for those of us who WORK everyday and have NOTHING to show. While everyone else is handed to them free and clear@
My Grandfather told me that he paid the Doctor with a Chicken.Have you ever watched the T.V. show,SCRUBS? Dr.Kelso tells the Interns to get the uninsured OUT,and if they die,thats what they get for not having Insurance.And that show is a comedy,not so funny in the real world.
To make matters worse, the hospital is making a killing with all of the outragous charges that they have. I recently had a baby and took a look at my itemized bill…I was charged $20 for a little strap to go across my belly, $750 for pain medication (pills) which when I left the hospital costed only $7.50 for a quantity of 30 without using my insurance, $500 for an epidural that was administered incorrectly, and the list goes on…Of course my insurance company covered the majority of it, but what about the poor souls that have no insurance or low quality insurance? If the hospitals would stop these outrageous charges, they would not be having these problems with Medicaid and Medicare. This greed should be stopped!
This problem is going to get worse before it gets better. Some people believe that the taxpayer (government) should pay for everyone’s medical care just because they cannot afford to. Just wait until Medicare and Social Security goes the way of Lehman Brothers.
Every person in the U.S. should watch Michael Moore’s documentary called Sycko. It is about how messed up the health care system in the U.S. is. It really made me think seriously about moving to France or the U.K. where all health care is free—for everyone. Please watch the movie and you will see how many people die every day by being turned away from hospitals because they are uninsured. Thanks—Miss Dee
What can we do? We protested the sale of our non-profit hospital to LifePoint but the Board did not listen.
When my sister worked there several years ago, she spoke with amazement at how much money the hospital really made and how they had to dump a million dollars at the end of every fiscal year to keep their non-profit status.
No amount of profit is ever enough. It is always more, more, more. Cut expenses, increase revenue. That kind of thinking has no place in medicine.
This should come as no surprise to the Danville area. The same thing happened to two medical clinics in our area.
What you must keep in mind is that the CEO’s of our hospitals, Danville and Martinsville, are looking forward to retirement. The more money they save, the larger their ‘Golden Parachute’. Pretty much the same thing that is happening on Wall Street.
Wake up, Danvillians, you are on a slippery slope.
It is just not right!!!
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