12/28/2023 0 Comments Ted anderson highland hospital oaklandThe health system is “publicly funded, and its mission is to care for the public, so we’d like to see this apparent in the governance structure also,” said Pearson. John Pearson, an emergency room nurse at Highland and Alameda Health System union chapter president, said the current model allows AHS administrators to operate the system as if it were in the private sector, and not a public safety net with an obligation to care for everyone in the county, especially low-income people and those without health insurance. Now, members of SEIU 1021, which represents 60,000 workers across Northern California, including nurses and other staff at AHS’s four hospitals and smaller facilities, want the county to take back control of the county health system. Meanwhile, the system continues to feel the pressures of the pandemic last Thursday, more than 20 COVID-19 patients in the emergency department at Highland Hospital waited for beds in the intensive care unit, according to an AHS physician. Workers represented by SEIU Local 1021 have been in contract negotiations for nearly a year, and California Nurses Association contracts have been in limbo for more than two years. The financial difficulties AHS is facing were complicated by the recent labor strike, which cost AHS an estimated $10 million. When this new system was adopted, AHS was the only public hospital system in California operating under this “unique” governance model, according to the analysis.īut while the health system enjoyed periods of profitability, it has struggled in some years, and recently it lost about $31 million between October 2019 and October 2020. AHS’s board has the power to hire and fire the hospital system’s CEO and administrators, who are in charge of hospital management, financials, and patient care. Since 1998, AHS has been governed by its own board, which is appointed by county supervisors. And they couldn’t recruit top-tier medical professionals because hospital salaries couldn’t exceed those of other county workers. For example, under the old system of county control, hospital executives couldn’t bid for lower prices because they didn’t have purchasing authority. In 1998, the health system transitioned to what’s called a “hospital authority” model, allowing it to run largely independently.Īccording to a 2009 analysis by the California Healthcare Foundation, this change made AHS more nimble and competitive. For decades, the county had been in charge of running AHS, then called Alameda County Medical Center. Number two, develop positive relationships with labor and the greater community, including the Board of Supervisors.”Ī more fundamental question looms over all of these challenges: who should run the Alameda Health System going forward? A unique way of running thingsĪlameda County’s public hospital system, which began operating in 1864, went through a dramatic change twenty years ago. “One, to resolve the labor dispute and settle the contract. “I’m hoping to achieve a couple of things,” Jeanette Dong, a new AHS board member and director of recreation and human services for the City of San Leandro, said during the meeting. On the agenda: the pandemic, budget woes, the search for a new chief executive officer, and the need to resolve the still-ongoing labor dispute with its unions. Last Wednesday, AHS’s new Board of Trustees, now comprised of four new members and four members returning from the old board, all recently appointed by county supervisors, held its first meeting. Even with doses of COVID-19 vaccine now on hand to protect many frontline employees, AHS faces a tough year ahead as the pandemic worsens and the hospital system’s budget problems deepen. In October, Alameda County’s Board of Supervisors voted to remove the entire AHS board. Employees claimed AHS’s board of trustees was failing to hold hospital executives accountable for mismanaging the pandemic response and an ongoing labor dispute. The pandemic thinly stretched the system’s resources over the summer, and in October, AHS health care workers went on strike for five days after warning that they didn’t have adequate personal protective equipment. It has been a tumultuous year for the Alameda Health System, the county’s public hospital authority.
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