Jackson Hospital announced last week that if an agreement on increased reimbursement rates wasn’t reached by June 25, they would begin their closing plan.
) - After hearing continued arguments from both sides in a case between Jackson Hospital and Blue Cross Blue Shield centered around reimbursement rates Wednesday afternoon, Judge Christopher Hawkins said he would likely rule in the next 24 hours whether he has jurisdiction in the proceedings.
“I feel pretty encouraged actually,” said Jackson Hospital CEO John Quinlivan following the hearing. “This was, like I said at the onset, a very narrow jurisdictional issue. I think both parties, our side and Blue Cross, agreed that the judge has jurisdiction to decide this case. ” If the judge decides he does not have jurisdiction or if an injunction is not granted, Quinlivan said he would have “serious concerns about our ability to sustain the hospital.
”that if an agreement on increased reimbursement rates wasn’t reached by June 25, they would begin their closing plan. Quinlivan clarified following the court hearing that was because past that date there wouldn’t be enough money to close the hospital properly. The debate centers around the hospital’s claim that they aren’t being paid similar rates as compared to other nearby hospitals for the same services by the insurance provider.
If an agreement is reached, lawyers representing BCBS said in court that tens of millions of dollars would first need to be paid to Jackson Investment Group and Jackson’s legal counsel before a dime makes it directly to the hospital.
“I don’t know if that was a misunderstanding or misconstrued, but that’s not true,” Quinlivan said. “The rates would flow directly to us immediately. ” BCBS lawyers also said in court that Jackson hasn’t provided any calculations showing that increased reimbursement rates would save the hospital. Quinlivan responded after the proceedings by saying there would still be “operational risk,” but the biggest thing for them is getting out of bankruptcy proceedings so they could focus on improving the hospital.
For now, there’s an anxious wait for a resolution, with doctors weighing if it is worth it to stay in Montgomery, and patients left to evaluate other healthcare options.
“I don’t know what will happen, where will I go if this hospital closes, so I can’t reassure my patients of what they will need to do,” Jackson Hospital OB-GYN Dr. LaToya Clark explained. “We’re losing staff at a critical rate, and they talk about why is this so urgent? The longer this drags on more and more of our nurses, our staff, our loyalty from staff, at some point they have to do self-preservation,” she continued.
“They’ve got to find something to do to protect their families, so the longer this continues to drag on we’re losing our help at this hospital and patient care will suffer. ”2 killed, 1 injured in overnight Montgomery crashSix men arrested in two-day Monroe County human trafficking operationGreenville police raid 4 businesses in illegal product crackdown
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