Monday, February 23 was Patricia Loccisano’s last day of work.
No, the Registered Nurse specializing in intensive care did not retire after 33 ½ years. Instead, Loccisano is one of the nearly 3,000 employees of St. John’s Queens and Mary Immaculate hospitals that suddenly are finding themselves without jobs as the two facilities proceed with closure, slated for Saturday, February 28.
In a statement, Caritas officials said, “Despite our best efforts working with Queens elected officials and with the New York State Department of Health (DOH) over the past several weeks, no adequate source of funding was identified and no long-term plan for the continued operation of the hospitals was forthcoming. The closing of these two desperately-needed health care facilities is a tragedy for the communities they serve and for the 2,900 dedicated workers who are losing their jobs.”
Caritas Health Care, Inc., which acquired St. John’s and Mary Immaculate Hospitals out of bankruptcy from the St. Vincent’s Catholic Medical Centers on January 1, 2007, reported operating losses estimated at $60 million for calendar year 2008.
However, they said, beginning in October of last year, “a new management team came on board and swiftly achieved significant expense reductions and operating efficiencies that reduced the projected losses for 2009 to $18 million.”
“Unfortunately,” they continued, “there was simply not enough time and funding for Caritas to complete the turnaround.
“Had our Queens elected officials been able to persuade the state to provide additional funds for the hospitals, they could have remained open and achieved fiscal stability in the near future. In reality, there was never a solution beyond allocating the necessary state funds to provide more time to complete the turnaround which was already under way.”
Many of the employees said they knew of Caritas’s financial difficulties, but never thought the hospitals would shutter their doors.
“We knew that this was coming, but we thought that it wasn’t going to come to an end. We never thought it was going to close,” said Jenny Rivera, Director of Patient Relations at St. John’s. “I thought I was going to retire from here. When we were bought by Caritas, I thought we’d be around for awhile.”
Last week, the DOH announced $18 million in grants to other facilities to ensure continuity of health care and to help in job placement.
The grants include $14.5 million to expand capacity at eight different health care facilities including $3.6 million to Health and Hospitals Corporation of New York City (HHC) to expand inpatient capacity and emergency room services at its Elmhurst and Queens Hospital Centers; $4.5 million to Medisys to expand inpatient capacity and emergency room services at its Jamaica and Flushing sites; $3.5 million to North Shore-LIJ to expand inpatient capacity and emergency room services at its Forest Hills and Franklin sites; $2.7 million to Wyckoff Medical Center to expand inpatient and emergency room services; and $650,000 to the Joseph P. Addabbo Family Health Centers to maintain primary and preventative services at the St. Dominic’s Health Care Center.
According to Michael Hinck, spokesperson for Medisys, “When we heard they were going to close we made immediate plans.”
On February 23, he told The Courier that, in the 10 days since ambulances were no longer accepted at St. John’s or Mary Immaculate, Jamaica Hospital saw “50 to 75 additional patients per day.” In-patient volume was at capacity as well, Hinck noted.
The DOH grants, then, he said, will go to adding emergency room space at Jamaica by taking non-clinical space and converting it; to adding four intensive care beds; and to the building of an additional 4-bed unit on the sixth floor. At Flushing Hospital, said Hinck, they will be opening an additional 21 beds, and at both facilities, they will be adding staff.
Terry Lynam, spokesperson for North Shore-LIJ, said that its $3.5 million grant would be divided – $2 million to Forest Hills and $1.5 to Franklin. Nevertheless, he noted, “We’re spending millions of additional dollars [above and beyond the grant money] to prepare.”
At Forest Hills, for example, said Lynam, most of the money will go to more space to treat an additional 12,800 ER patients annually. They are also adding an operating room and dozens of additional staff to increase ability to care for thousands of added inpatients.
In addition, he noted, North Shore-LIJ has its own ambulance service, which will be taking over some of the runs from St. John’s and Mary Immaculate – an estimated 4,000 additional transports a year.
A spokesperson for HHC told The Courier that Elmhurst Hospital would receive $1.5 million and Queens Hospital Center $2.1.
As for Loccisano, whose husband is retired and who has two sons in school – one in Queens College and one in Holy Cross High School – she said she has been applying for jobs.
“I still have to work,” she told The Courier, noting that the couple has a $300,000 mortgage.
“It’s devastating,” she went on. “I never thought I’d live to see the day the hospitals would close. If they managed the hospitals this way [the way they have managed the closure], we’d still be open.”
– With additional reporting by Claudia Cruz
