Dive Brief:
- Saint Michael's Medical Center of Newark has issued its second challenge to a state-commissioned study by Navigant Consulting, which concluded that three of the area's five hospitals should be converted from full-service facilities to outpatient ambulatory/emergency care facilities.
- Navigant determined that the hospitals provided excess capacity and recommended keeping just two, University Hospital in Newark and Clara Maass Medical Center in Belleville, as full-service.
- Saint Michael's argues that this plan would reduce local hospital competition, potentially driving up costs, and that it would reduce hospital capacity to the point that area residents would have to seek care outside the city.
Dive Insight:
The stakes are high for Newark hospitals given the drastic changes proposed, and Saint Michael's is now questioning Navigant's calculations.
The hospital argues that Navigant failed to accurately account for the state's cost to operate University Hospital or to accurately forecast healthcare demand in the coming years.
It points out that "Newark inpatient hospitalization rates are higher than New Jersey or national averages" as a result of "a poorer, sicker population that needs more hospital care." It argues that the healthcare trends of the suburbs toward decreased hospital care and increased outpatient care don't apply to Newark.
"There is no cookie cutter that says we will need fewer beds," said David A. Ricci, CEO and president of Saint Michael's. "We fundamentally think there is going to be more need in this city because we have a very sick population in the Newark area."