LAS VEGAS -- It was more than a year ago that former Clark County Commission Chairman Rory Reid proposed transforming University Medical Center into a full-fledged teaching hospital.
Reid suggested the move could help stop the budgetary bleeding at the county facility -- while at the same time -- improve the quality of care. Yet the I-Team has learned -- that goal -- is no where near achievement.
The path toward an academic medical center at UMC is crowded. There are seven county commissioners who oversee the hospital plus another 11 people who were appointed to its advisory board. That on top of the existing hospital administration. Consensus among any group that large can be a challenge and in this case it's not even close.
"UMC's been around as long as I've been alive and it's going to take a little time to fix it but we're going to fix it as quickly as we can," said then Clark County Commission Chairman Rory Reid in Jan. 2010. He was announcing his plan to transform UMC into a full-fledged teaching hospital.
"At the rate we are going, a snail's pace, we will have done very very little," said Barbara Robinson.
"We are looking for some direction as to how to get us out of the weeds and back to the vision thing," said Dr. Anthony Marlon.
"I frankly don't understand why we have confusion about this," said Dr. John Ruckdeschel.
Confusion may be too diplomatic a word for the obvious breakdown on display during a recent joint meeting of the UMC Board of Trustees, aka the Clark County Commission, and the UMC advisory board, which is made up of 11 community members selected for their expertise.
"We need to get out of our own way," said Dr. Marlon, a former owner and board chairman of Sierra Health Services. He is the advisory commission chairperson. "I'm hoping that everybody took away from that meeting what I did. That it was a disaster and that maybe we'll rethink what our role is strategy-wise," he said.
Though initially formed to explore and facilitate UMC's transformation into an academic medical center, the role of the advisory board, as approved by the county commission, also includes oversight of the hospital's budget, policies, and quality of care.
During its four meetings, Dr. Marlon explains, the majority of his fellow board members have focused on existing hospital contracts. "We can't get by the routine matters to even consider the strategy issues on stuff like governance and stuff like academic medical centers which is where I think we should be spending our time."
Earlier this year, an outside consultant recommended a two-part strategy to reform the hospital. First, improve operational efficiencies to save some $40 million over the next two years. Next, restructure to become an independent 501(c)(3) public benefit corporation. It would be a change in governance, which according to FTI Healthcare would insulate the hospital from political agendas, improve its access to capital, like grants and charitable donations, and allow for greater agility in its response to a competitive marketplace.
Without swift action, the consultant notes, UMC could be forced to close.
"To come in and do it overnight is not realistic," said Commissioner Lawrence weekly, who is the chair of the hospital board of trustees. "We made a mistake in the beginning of rushing to put the advisory board together without any type of parameters. We rushed in to make it happen and sat back and thought okay. Now, we have to come back and help fix it and we're going to do that."
The latest advisory board agenda includes discussion of the board's role and further evaluation of the 501c(c)(3) model which is recommended by the consultants. Whether either of those conversations results in any action, remains to be seen.
