Wednesday, August 22, 2018

Drama in the Delta

General Hospital may be fading away but if someone needs her fix of hospital drama, all she has to do is go up to the Delta.  The Taxpayers Channel reported yesterday:




Tonight, over one hundred citizens who attended the Hospital Board meeting this evening were outraged when their questions were ignored and the Board voted to expel the press and the public from the majority of the meeting.

TTC Video of the Board Meeting may be seen here: Greenwood Leflore Hospital Board Meeting, August 21, 2018
About 28 minutes into the meeting, Board Chairman Sammy Foster called for a motion to go into executive session. The audience vocally objected, and one citizen was given three minutes to ask a few questions.

When her time was up, the Board immediately voted to go into closed session without addressing a single one of her questions. The audience was visibly and vocally outraged, with some audience members loudly demanding "we want some answers!"

The Board went into executive session anyway, and expelled the public and the doctors from the room.
Board attorney Thomas Flanagan, along with a member of hospital security, assisted in enforcing the board's order for the citizens to leave the room.

The press and the public were excluded from the meeting for 1 hour and 22 minutes.

Many audience members lingered in the hallway outside the room where the Board was meeting in secret, and discussed the hospital's collapse, and how nothing can be done about it.

But wait, we're just getting started.  TPC reported a couple of days ago:

 The Greenwood Leflore Hospital (GLH) stripped off a surgeon's disputed credentials from its sign and website less than 8 hours after The Taxpayers Channel first broke the story of the dispute at 10:30 this morning.

Dr. Alain Domkam, a surgeon employed by the hospital, has claimed as late as Monday evening that he is a Fellow of the prestigious American College of Surgeons. The College claims that he is not, and informed The Taxpayers Channel last Friday that it had begun the process of requiring Dr. Domkam to remove the title from his name and qualification list.

This morning, we reported the conflicting claims of Dr. Domkam and the College, and provided photographic evidence that both the hospital clinic sign and the GLH website described Domkam as a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons (FACS).

Our original article, with pictures and quotes, may be seen here: Greenwood Surgeon's Credentials Questioned.
Hospital CFO and acting administrator Dawne Holmes never responded to our requests for comment.

But as of close of business day, GLH had painted out the FACS title from Dr. Domkam's name on the clinic sign, and had completely removed all references to his being an FACS from its website.

Of course, this being the Delta, the drama never ends.  UMMC high-tailed it away from Leflore County.  TPC reported five days ago:

Multiple sources have confirmed that the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) has withdrawn its two proposals to provide management and medical services affiliation with the financially failing Greenwood Leflore Hospital.

This morning, Greenwood City Council member Johnny Jennings posted on Facebook the statement: "Was just notified by UMMC that they were withdrawing their affiliation proposal procedure with The Greenwood-Leflore Hospital because of the lack of action by the GLH Hospital Board."

This afternoon, TTC has confirmed the UMMC withdrawal from another source as well. We are still awaiting a formal public announcement from either UMMC or the Hospital Board.

A majority of the hospital board members (Sammy Foster, Emma Bell, and Freddie White-Johnson) had publicly expressed opposition to the UMMC proposals.

UMMC withdrawal had long been anticipated after the Hospital Board failed to act or express majority support for the effort. In fact, at a joint Board-Medical Staff meeting held July 25th, Board members specifically solicited opinions from the Medical Staff to oppose the affiliation. Far from agreeing with Bell, White-Johnson, and Foster, the overwhelming majority of the physicians expressed cautious support for the UMMC proposals.

Then, at a special hospital board meeting August 7, the two proposals from UMMC to provide management and affiliation were both presented, but no board member made any motion to accept either proposal. The Board went into Executive Session and the press and the public were excluded for 2 hours.

The Hospital, which is on track to lose at least $8 million this fiscal year, has been searching for a way forward since it summarily fired CEO Jim Jackson last March. No new CEO has been appointed.

Sources have told TTC that the Hospital Board has received over 20 applicants for the CEO position, and has narrowed it down to five.

Supposedly, the Board is vetting the remaining five applicants, and at present is limiting physician input to a small set of doctors not selected by the Medical Staff to represent them in the matter.

Neither the Chief of Staff, Dr. Henry Flautt, nor the Staff Liaison, Dr. George Smith, were included by the Board to provide advice on the CEO selection.

Naturally, the names of the doctors chosen by the Board to provide input are a secret.

I just can't cope, without my soaps.  

23 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Greenwood public hospital, like the Greenwood public school system, now exists primarily to provide make-work jobs to layabouts who can't or won't work elsewhere. That being the case, the idea of giving control to UMMC was DOA. And it shouldn't be hard to figure out which doctors the board members are listening to. Too bad Arnold Smith isn't around anymore to chime in.

It wasn't always this way, but it certainly is now.

Anonymous said...


So, what's the rest of the story?

Is it going to close?

Is the Hospital Board a bunch of idiots?

Looks like blacks on one side of the table and white's on the other? Is this reflective of disagreements?

Alpha Storm said...

Don't be taking me to "Ruleville" if I get sick. Just take me to St Dominic Hospital, or the Baptist Hospital. If its life threatening take me to the University Hospital.

Anonymous said...

What does the lady say? "Take me to Ruleville!"

Anonymous said...

Warm up the car Kingfish!

Anonymous said...

The Hospital Board is just a P-nut gallery of yes men for the BIG MONEY hospital conglomerates like NMHS. The board will conveniently allow/enable the small independent hospitals to fade into oblivion to become staging facilities for the regional hospitals. No one knows who owns the Tupelo based NMHS and its money pit North Mississippi Medical Center or how much the owners are each laundering out of that pit and the press and media in Mississippi seem to favor keeping that organization's secrets closely guarded.

Mississippi is the most corrupt state in the nation and healthcare, education, infrastructure and corrections are in a struggle to outdo each other in accumulating power and padding the pockets of the politicians who are wise in their choice of crooks to support. These Konservative GOPs are the Dixie Mafia's finest statesmen.

Anonymous said...

I'll take my chances bleeding out on the way to St Dom, rather than die in the Greenwood or Grenada Hospitals.

Pappy Odaniel said...

This ain’t jack compared to everything else going on in the Delta. Clarksdale Public Utilities has missing funds, illegal wiretaps, illicit middle of the night bagman runs to Starkghanistan and then a mayor who almost got Butler Snow to provide bond services for a felon to develop 3 softball fields for $50 million

Anonymous said...

This is typical of what happens when the racial divide comes to the surface. It's payback time to the white citizens of Greenwood and Leflore county. Black citizens have no economic power in the Delta. The only power they have is the political arena and the institutions they control--such as the hospital. So, the bottom rail comes to the top. Sammy Foster, the Hospital Board President is now in complete control with the backing of the black council and supervisors. "It's our turn now" is the theme. They want black administrators, black leadership, black department heads, and if it takes 10 employees to do one job then that's okay. They do not believe the hospital can fail and have said, to quote Mr. Jourdan, "This hospital will not close". The hospital is bleeding red ink. In a matter of months the juggling of invoices to pay will become problematic. Reserves will dwindle to nothing. The hospital will not be able to cut itself into prosperity and there are no additional sources of revenue. The hospital will eventually be given away in a fire sale eventually and will not be recognizable as the institution it is now. And, if anyone thinks a new administrator will be able to save the hospital then you're in for a rude awakening. As long as employees have the ear and access to Board members a new administrator will have no authority. Already there are instances where employees had to be disciplined but they knew a Board member who then stopped the disciplinary action. This was a common complaint when the HFX consulting group polled hospital employees about problems with the hospital. Competence and following processes are too important in an hospital to be ignored. As was stated in a Greenwood Commonwealth editorial, the Board members are not qualified by background or experience to make decisions for a 100 million dollar business.

John Pittman Hey said...

In case some of the commentors don't know, Greenwood Leflore Hospital is jointly owned by Greenwood and Leflore County. As a government owned hospital, most of the Open Meetings and Public Records laws don't apply, making it difficult to investigate its employees, contracts, spending, quality, management, etc.

Anonymous said...

"Black citizens have no economic power in the Delta."

Sez 7:30.

Actually that's not at all true. When a group (in this case blacks or African Americans or whatever else they demand to be called) seized control of almost all the government jobs in the Delta going back about 15 or so years ago. And along with controlling the municipal and county governments throughout most of the Delta, plus all of the public education institutions, also goes all of the jobs and paychecks, thus control of millions of monthly dollars. THAT IS ECONOMIC POWER!

This was set upon as a goal back in the mid sixties and it's come fully to fruition. That cannot be successfully denied.

In fact Cleveland, MS, is the only municipality (that comes to mind) in the Mississippi Delta that has not fallen prey to this dynamic. Cleveland is an oddity in that it's never had a black mayor or majority black city council. That's the only thing that has kept Cleveland afloat.

And all of that 'economic power' that has been enjoyed by blacks in every other town and rat hole in the Delta, has turned the place into absolute shit. Doubt me at your own peril.

Anonymous said...

The plantation owners from Oxford offered a partnership with them - of course to appear supportive, but with the intent to eventually take it over - but the hospital leadership saw through that game right away, and shot the idea down. Nothing's changed since 1865.

Anonymous said...

Lawyer Pittman Hey has suggested 'government' is not subject to open meetings laws? I thought, in fact, government is about the only one that IS covered by such regulations. Either he is confused or I misunderstood his post.

Anonymous said...

Hey 6:24, everything has changed since 1965 and most for the worse. Victims abound and truth is whatever one wishes it to be... very sad. Oh, and you are a dumbass!

Wise Owl said...

Despite the brew ha ha the hospital still provides decent care. Does race need be the underlying issue of every problem? Only in Mississippi. Oh and Newark, Detroit, Chicago, Kansas City, St Louis, Memphis, New Orleans, Atlanta, Washington, shallow I on?

Anonymous said...

People like 10:49 are why the rest of the country views Mississippi as a largely rascist state.

Anonymous said...

If there were a partnership and thus some sunshine, the nepotism and no-show jobs would rear their ugly heads? Asking for a friend.

Anonymous said...

10:56 Thin skinned? Truth bruises some folks.

Anonymous said...

The issue is much more simple....the hospital is surrounded by lots of people with no insurance or government insurance whose reimbursement rates are not sufficient to support the hospital. That's why hospitals track movements of populations....Desoto County has lots of insureds and a big hospital.....Madison is now a hot bed for new hospitals as it is stacked with privately insured people....and Jackson's hospitals are bleeding ink like a gun shot victim because fewer residents are privately insured.

Greenwood's hospital will not exist in its current state in 5 years. It will be much smaller and they will transfer most to Jackson or Memphis.


Rural hospitals are closing rapidly.

John Pittman Hey said...

9:38, The legislature has carved out specific exceptions to open meetings and public records laws for government owned hospitals.

Anonymous said...

10:56 AM This state is more racist now than it was 50 years ago. It will never change.

I Forgot To Mention Medical Transport Jobs said...

"Wise Owl said...Does race need be the underlying issue of every problem?"

To answer your question, no, it doesn't NEED to be. But, the fact is race HAS to be the underlying issue since it's a reality and is the cause of almost every problem in the 19 Delta counties. That's roughly a fourth of the state.

State, county, municipal and school district jobs (and other PERS cushions) probably make up 60% of employment in those counties. That translates in more ways than one. And arguably 90% of those jobs has finally been handed to African Americans. Does it 'NEED' to be that way? NO. Is it a fact? YES.

Anonymous said...

Race really is the most significant issue of Mississippi state and locl government


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If you get tired come relax at the Fox News Tent. To gain admittance to the VIP section, bring either your Republican Party ID card or a Rebel Flag. Bringing both will entitle you to free drinks.Get your tickets now. Since this is an event for trolls, no ID is required, just bring the hate. Bring the family, Trollfest '07 is for EVERYONE!!!

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