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To sit back and take a look at where we have come and how we got here is disturbing to say the least. The constant finger pointing has morphed into a huge snowball rolling downhill and the momentum comes from the same tired, boring place it always does…It appears in every workplace, school, church and sometimes at family gatherings… belief that somehow, someone else is responsible for my unhappiness.
Oh how people love to complain about their pitiful lives and are resolute in their commitment to not do a thing about their situation. Have we not progressed enough to understand that our happiness is not determined by Joe Damore or the physicians or anyone else for that matter? If you don’t like working at Mission then why are you putting yourselves through the anguish you describe? Quit! If you are convinced that Mission is a ship destined to run aground because of it’s crazy captain – then abandon ship before it hits the reef! Do everyone else a favor, save yourself!
Moral at Mission is not low. It is only low in the people it is always low in. The same 4% of overall hospital staff that fill out 90% of the employee satisfaction surveys completed. Everyone knows these people. They would not be happy winning the lottery because they had to pay taxes on the winnings…Their moral is low. Who cares?
It is amazing to me that the mountains surrounding this tiny town have so blinded us to what is going on in the world today that we actually think that removing the present administration at Mission Hospitals is going to make everything all better. Why? Why would that make it all better? Don’t you remember when there were problems with the past administration…and the one before that? I have an idea – why not start with you as a place to initiate change? Take some responsibility for it instead of expending so much creative energy trying to drill someone else to the wall.
Mission Hospitals is this lumbering behemoth of an organization and like most healthcare organizations it has been a very sloppily run business and a lot of misdirected expectations and bad habits have formed as a result. I’ve watched for years as the hospital has continued to hemorrhage money…Now it is being forced into an agile state so it can be competitive – not in a local market but in a national market. The nurse to patient ratio at Mission Hospitals is smaller than one would find with many of our competitors – including Carolinas. You want to tell me there will be better patient care when we are having to take care of 6+ patients a piece? C’mon, do your homework I Healthcare is just being forced to catch up with what corporate America has been doing for decades. Talk about shoddy leadership!
I believe the present administration understands what it is going to take to obtain the flexibility to maintain our viability in the immediate future. I think they do have our interests at heart despite our "eat our young" mentality.
Tough times require tough decisions and sometimes those decisions "trim the fat" in a much needed way. For someone to assume that experienced staff was fired for no reason or because they were being paid more, is ludicrous. Do you think that person’s privacy should be breached so everyone knows that they were fired because they had 18 absences? Do you really believe that the hospital was getting rid of experienced professionals and replacing them with inexperienced people who could be paid less? C’mon…it would cost a heck of a lot more money to pay for the lawsuits the hospital would have lost due to that inexperience. Think about it…!
The present leadership at Mission hospitals is far from perfect and continued work needs to be done to regain the trust needed between physicians and the hospital administration. Please remember all of us little people that are caught in the middle….we are the ones that have to listen to our neighbors, friends and families discussing this. It is embarrassing to witness because, to them, I am Mission Hospitals. Whether the players like it or not it is a symbiotic relationship. While everyone is busy peeing on trees as the fire grows larger, please don’t lose sight of how this is effecting the community you have all sworn to serve…the community all of you are a part of.
Oh…4 US troops died in Afghanistan yesterday. How many of you thought about their families today?
To sit back and take a look at where we have come and how we got here is disturbing to say the least. The constant finger pointing has morphed into a huge snowball rolling downhill and the momentum comes from the same tired, boring place it always does…It appears in every workplace, school, church and sometimes at family gatherings… belief that somehow, someone else is responsible for my unhappiness.
Oh how people love to complain about their pitiful lives and are resolute in their commitment to not do a thing about their situation. Have we not progressed enough to understand that our happiness is not determined by Joe Damore or the physicians or anyone else for that matter? If you don’t like working at Mission then why are you putting yourselves through the anguish you describe? Quit! If you are convinced that Mission is a ship destined to run aground because of it’s crazy captain – then abandon ship before it hits the reef! Do everyone else a favor, save yourself!
Moral at Mission is not low. It is only low in the people it is always low in. The same 4% of overall hospital staff that fill out 90% of the employee satisfaction surveys completed. Everyone knows these people. They would not be happy winning the lottery because they had to pay taxes on the winnings…Their moral is low. Who cares?
It is amazing to me that the mountains surrounding this tiny town have so blinded us to what is going on in the world today that we actually think that removing the present administration at Mission Hospitals is going to make everything all better. Why? Why would that make it all better? Don’t you remember when there were problems with the past administration…and the one before that? I have an idea – why not start with you as a place to initiate change? Take some responsibility for it instead of expending so much creative energy trying to drill someone else to the wall.
Mission Hospitals is this lumbering behemoth of an organization and like most healthcare organizations it has been a very sloppily run business and a lot of misdirected expectations and bad habits have formed as a result. I’ve watched for years as the hospital has continued to hemorrhage money…Now it is being forced into an agile state so it can be competitive – not in a local market but in a national market. The nurse to patient ratio at Mission Hospitals is smaller than one would find with many of our competitors – including Carolinas. You want to tell me there will be better patient care when we are having to take care of 6+ patients a piece? C’mon, do your homework I Healthcare is just being forced to catch up with what corporate America has been doing for decades. Talk about shoddy leadership!
I believe the present administration understands what it is going to take to obtain the flexibility to maintain our viability in the immediate future. I think they do have our interests at heart despite our "eat your young" mentality. Do you not remember how it felt last year when we found out about the state Medicaid reimbursement cuts? Do you remember that not a single person lost their job to make up for the millions needed to balance the budget? How about this year when businesses all around us are shutting down and laying off because of the present economic crisis…and we haven’t experienced one layoff? Who do you think is responsible for this? Now think about what would probably have happened to you if you worked in banking, the auto industry, pharmaceuticals, etc?
Tough times require tough decisions and sometimes those decisions "trim the fat" in a much needed way. For someone to assume that experienced staff was fired for no reason or because they were being paid more, is ludicrous. Do you think that person’s privacy should be breached so everyone knows that they were fired because they had 18 absences? Do you really believe that the hospital was getting rid of experienced professionals and replacing them with inexperienced people who could be paid less? C’mon…it would cost a heck of a lot more money to pay for the lawsuits the hospital would have lost due to that inexperience. Think about it…!
The present leadership at Mission hospitals is far from perfect and continued work needs to be done to regain the trust needed between physicians and the hospital administration. Please remember all of us little people that are caught in the middle….we are the ones that have to listen to our neighbors, friends and families discussing this. It is embarrassing to witness because, to them, I am Mission Hospitals. Whether the players like it or not it is a symbiotic relationship. While everyone is busy peeing on trees as the fire grows larger, please don’t lose sight of how this is effecting the community you have all sworn to serve…the community all of you are a part of.
Oh…4 US troops died in Afghanistan yesterday. How many of you thought about their families today?
Solve a problem by looking at what and when it started. Enough said about Mission’s current mess and how to fix it.
As I recall this mess got started in the early 2000s.At that time there was an economic downturn,business had slowed,new businesses were not coming to the area and the cost of medical care was adjudged by several businessmen to be too high and contributory to the problem.Some of these businessmen (property/land developement,textiles,paper,heavy equipment)(some of whom were on the MMH board and still are) held meetings with several medical groups,employers threatened to send their insured to other areas for care and as I recall not much beneficial happened.Bob Burgin was leaving and a search committee appointed by the board came up with the current administration.This came from Michigan but had been in Greenville SC earlier (something an investigative reporter should look into).The idea was to cut costs so everyone but the health care industry could flourish.This led to the idea of a Mission based PPO or HMO which was found to be more difficult than expected.The other idea was to hire hospital based MDs on a short term contract and squeeze them in later contracts as well as abusing them as employees–ie the trauma surgeon debacle.The idea of buying practices,which has happened is also in vogue.Terminating experienced nurses who are more expensive (but more than worth it) in lieu of recent graduates who are less costly but less experienced.In addition nurses with decades of experience are made to "re apply" for their job so they could be further intimidated.ICU nurses have been leaving for the VA–the adm answer to this is the VA only has a few places for nurses–what a way to address the problem.Nurses who have had experience for years in a specialty and who know best how to manage patients with problems in their realm of competence are being randomly shifted to other areas. In the meantime Haywood County Hospital ran into trouble and MMH was talking to them about assistance–when lo and behold along comes Carolinas Medical and is now set up in Haywood and Jackson Counties.This could block referrals from the west if they get stronger.Angel Community Hospital in Franklin is apparently in discussions with someone.St Lukes has been nipped by Spartanburg.Pardee and Park Ridge Transylvania, who knows.To the east ,Hickory,WInston-Salem and Carolinas are active.It would be somewhat ironic if we were left with a huge hospital for Buncombe,Madison,McDowell and Avery counties.We spent decades establishing a great hospital,medical care and referral patterns and to see this is disturbing.Medicine is changing throughout the US and we all realize this,but as Dr.Jon Silver said–this is local and is not representative of other areas. I hate to ramble but if the board thinks by going around chatting with the groups who are raising concern is going to correct this problem then they must have an insite I really dont think the board as it is currently,although competent in their individual endeavors,really understands the depth of the problem. Unfortunately boards only know as much as they are told by those running the board–administration.Where is ACTimes,the community wants to know??
Cleaning house of Damore, Aston, Ford and Roloff is probably all that is necessary to turn this around. Believe it or not, there have been some "good hires" during these disgusting five years of King Damore. I compare what is happening to Mission right now to what happened earlier this year at AB-Tech. Their board acted quickly and decisively–that is what the Mission board needs to do as well. Wouldn’t it be great to start our new FY in October without these four power-crazed, heartless rejects.
Amen to both postings of August 23. The misery at Mission runs both deep and wide, affecting almost all employees and negatively affecting their work performance.
I am suspicious of responses that cite "good old boy network" and imply or state that veteran staff at Mission are resistant to change or too slow to understand change. The current administration’s mantra has been that pre-Damore employees (and I suppose that includes physicians) are just too backward and slow to keep up the pace. The difference that most of us at Mission perceive is that the Damore administration’s changes are rarely aimed at enhancing patient care. Most of us were extremely proud of working at Mission and proud of our personal contributions toward making it an excellent hospital. After all, it is the hospital that will serve the people we love and most of us kept that in the front of our minds. We were also mindful that our responsibility to the community (Western N.C.) was greater than usual as Mission is the region’s only site for complicated and/or life-threatening medical conditions. This mindset was fostered and supported for many years and changed only with the advent of the current administration.
Bullying, accusations, and threats certainly constitute a mangement style but whether it is a positive and productive management style is a different issue. I concur with a previous writer’s opinion that Mission will move forward only when the board meets its obligations and removes Damore and friends. It will be interesting to see if the board has the intellect and integrity to correct the mistake that was made in bringing Damore onboard.
" . . .The next issue that should be dealt with is why the media left this alone, and still is pussy-footing around instead of getting to the core of how it happened. They are being reactive, not proactive. . . "
No real journalists left in Asheville? Citizen-Times has clearly abdicated the role of newspaper. Has Mountain Express abdicated its role as well?
Newspaper junkie is wise..when will we get the true facts, instead of all of this rumor mongoring, piling on, and half-truths. Most of the comments that have been shared address a "vast subject", with "half-vast knowledge:. As a physician on the staff at Mission, I know that there were many occasions during which I was sad to witness the unraveling and emotional deterioration of our trauma director, through stress, burnout, and just plaiin being tired. There was considerable strife in his own service, and many of his colleagues were trying to develop a plan to help him through a personal crisis.
My specialty has dealt with JD frequently during the past two years, and while we don’t always agree, he must serve the role of a ‘change agent’ that guides the system into a very ominous future – relative to reform and new competition. We don’t like change at Mission, particularly we physicians. But the folly of firing the change agent just because some of our doctors don’t want to take call from a concerned physician at 3am on a Sunday morning, is ludicrous. What will the Board do when the new guy/gal introduces needed change? and the next?? and the next?? I spoke with the blue-ribbon committee under Mr. Moore last week, and I feel we should await his findings and suggestions before we make stupid decisions.
No idea whether Mr Damore is competent or what his deal is, but it seems to me that this sounds strangely similar to the uproar at ABTech when they lost their longtime administrator. The previous CEO at Mission was there forever, as was K Ray Bailey. Could it be that people are so set in their ways that they have a hard time adjusting to new ways of thinking and acting? Not taking up for Damore or for the ousted AB Tech prez – I don’t know them from Adam – it just seems very similar.
Whoever you are, you’re late (and very right on), but welcome to the party. Hopefully that will happen, but then Mr. Renfro needs to clean house. "Assuming" a new administration, there are MAJOR changes (in methodology) that will have to be overseen by the board, and few on that board have the knowledge to oversee those changes (or time to learn or get the background they will need to understand, because some of them are on so many boards they don’t have time to get to the next board meeting…no names, but you know who you are…much less come up to speed on what they will need to know).
The next issue that should be dealt with is why the media left this alone, and still is pussy-footing around instead of getting to the core of how it happened. They are being reactive, not proactive. Finally, for those in the city that knew but stood by and watched (excluding those inside who, had they acted could /would have been fired), you share the blame for the agony and conditions the employees have had to endure, for the cost this will incur to recover and for the misery you have brought to the city. Remember that for a long time. To be a bystander is to abet, That simple.
To be a board member is a commitment, not a "feather in one’s social bonnet." Especially for a community hospital, it a responsibility to do what is right, to understand the problems with which the doctors are faced, to understand the governmental conditions under which you must operate…so many things. If you aren’t knowledgeable and aren’t willing to commit the months you should, please go be a diletante somewhere else.
When can we expect your comprehensive investigative report (or series of reports) in Mountain Express detailing all the pros, cons, accusations, responses, and finally, the facts of this ongoing saga?