EOMC starting to see surgeries scheduled; PT open house set Wednesday afternoon
Eastern Oklahoma Medical Center Chief Executive Officer Bob Carter told the LeFlore County Hospital Authority Board during Tuesday afternoon’s meeting at EOMC that the surgery department is starting to get surgeries scheduled with an opening day of Feb. 8. Dr. Zbigniew T Beyga, M.D., general surgeon, is seeing patients at the Family Medical Clinic. Carter also mentioned that Dr. Randy Matos will begin performing surgeries in March.
Carter told the board that EOMC is working with several agencies to bring specialty care such as tele-cardiology and tele-neurology to the community. EOMC also is working with the Medicus, a provider recruitment firm, to bring additional family practice and hospitalist physicians to EOMC.
Other information provide to the board included that the public school telemedicine equipment has arrived and will be installed in schools around the county in the near future.
There will be a ribboncutting ceremony at 2 p.m. Wednesday to celebrate the grand opening of the new outpatient physical therapy department, which has just been recently completed.
Carter reported that the emergency room saw 13,500 patients in 2022, which is up about 2,000 patients from 2021’s total. He also reported that the laboratory has been extremely busy and processed a record 704 lab tests in one day.
If there was some concerning news Carter shared with the board, it was about what 2023 very well may have in store for hospitals across the nation. He said that reports are indicating that it will be the worst year to date financially, especially for rural hospitals. Currently, 33 of Oklahoma’s 72 rural hospitals are in danger of closing with 15 of those hospitals having double-digit negative operating margins, making them especially vulnerable. He said that 2023 is the year that more than 50 percent of the Medicare age population will move from traditional Medicare to a Medicare Advantage Plan and that number is expected to grow to 70 percent by 2030. This increase will put more strain on hospitals to get tests and procedures approved and appropriately care for patients. However, Carter said EOMC’s administrative team is taking an active approach to the matter, having a goal to better its bottom line by $1 million this year.
In her report, EOMC Infection Preventionist Kelsey McGee, R.N. told the board that the influenza numbers are declining, but the COVID case numbers are about the same. She said for November, there were 15 positive COVID cases detected, but that number rose to 84 for December.
In his report, EOMC Chief Operations Officer Logan Hayes told the board the patient response to the new radiology waiting area has been overwhelmingly positive and are very appreciative of having the extra space for wheelchair access.
Hayes said the departmental surveillance was recently completed at EOMC’s Heavener Clinic, in which areas in which improvements were shown and steps to fix those have taken place.
The board approved declaring an Onar generator for surplus, then approved sending out sealed bids to have it purchased.
In his statistical report, Northeast Health Systems representative Rick Wagner said that the most encouraging statistic was the fact that EOMC saw 1,230 ER patients in November, which is an average of 40 patients per day. He said that the strong ER performance speaks volumes with regards to the entire facility since the good review does nothing but promote good things about EOMC.
In her improving organization performance (IOP) report, Dr. Beth Hites said there were 43 inpatient discharges, 35 observation discharges, 1,224 ER discharges and 22 swing bed discharges for November for a total number of discharges for the month being 1,324.
The board approved the two Medical Executive Committee (MEC) initial appointments — Sherif Latif, M.D. for EOMC’s tele-hospitalist services and Christopher Henthorn, CRNA in anesthesiology services — and three MEC non-provisional appointments — Heath Spencer, D.O in emergency services and ARPNs Crystal Ollie and Edwards Wemmerus in allied health services.
In his financial report, Wagner said there was a slight profit in November, with a biggest factor being $4,336,193 in gross patient revenue. With the combined cash balance of $4,730,877 plus the $3-plus million in employee retention tax credits from the Internal Revenue Service, Wagner said the $7-plus million in cash reserves will help EOMC when it comes to the rough waters Carter mentioned that are likely coming in 2023.
The first meeting of Tuesday afternoon’s doubleheader of meetings was the LeFlore County Sales Tax Supported Hospital Authority board meeting, in which Wagner told the board that there was greater than $200,000 in sales tax revenue in December and, after a $105,000 transfer to EOMC, greater than $9,000 to the good.