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‘Interactive,’ ‘interdisciplinary’ care now the word at former Woodland Park Hospital
LEE PERLMAN
THE MID-COUNTY MEMO
The news from Physicians Hospital just keeps getting better and better. Following the bankruptcy and closure of Woodland Park Hospital earlier this year, it would have been good news just to know that the 54-year-old institution at 10300 N.E. Hancock St. was reopening, and would not be another blighted vacant building. It would be great news that the new institution would be owned by four resident physicians, all with deep roots in the hospital and the community. Better yet that it would follow an “interdisciplinary” model, with traditional medicine combined with alternative practices such as chiropractic and naturopathy. Dr. Bryce Milam of the Parkrose Chiropractic Clinic, one of the four Physicians principals, told the Memo that while this model is not unique in the U.S., it is a first for Portland.
However, as Physicians CEO Kerry O’Leary told the Opportunity Gateway Program Advisory Committee last month, there is more good news. Physicians will operate on a Planetree model, one of 105 hospitals to do so and the only one in Portland. In a Planetree hospital there is “interactive medicine,” where patients participate in making key decisions about their own care, to the point of reading and writing on their medical charts. To assist them in understanding their ailments and treatment, the hospital will maintain a library of medical literature written in laymen’s language and geared to a “ninth grade to 12th grade” sophistication level, O’Leary said. The library will also be available to the public, she said. “We empower patients to make their own decisions rather than have health care be something that is done to them,” she said.
Behavioral health and emergency care
Of the hospital’s 170 beds, about 30 will be devoted to “behavioral health” patients - people with mental or emotional problems. There is a serious shortage of such facilities, with the state hospital full and many mental patients left to emergency rooms to deal with, O’Leary said. “Surgery is the number one hospital money maker, but there are other areas that are just as critical, and behavioral health is one of them,” she said.
What Physicians will not offer is an emergency room - O’Leary says there are eight such facilities within a seven-mile radius - but it will have something that may be better in some ways. They will provide walk-in care for serious but non-critical injuries under a department Physicians call Emergent Care.
“In an E.R. you could have an injury that isn’t critical but hurts just as much as one that is, yet you keep getting bumped,” she said. “You could wait hours for treatment.”
If all this sounds exciting and intriguing to you, you’re not the only one.
“We’ve had many, many expressions of interest from top notch physicians and surgeons,” O’Leary said. “We have three general surgeons who have moved their entire practice here from Southwest Washington, and there are three more to come.” She added, “We have to have a critical mass of physicians to supply adequate care. We’re the underdog, so we have to do better.”
The hospital could be open by December, she said. Initially it will be open 12 hours a day, but within eight weeks of opening it should operate “24/7,” she said.
They already have signed contracts with such health systems as the Oregon Dental Society, Health Net and Lifewise. “Blue Cross says they have ‘a great feeling for us,’ but I want to see it in writing,” O’Leary said. In answer to a question, she said Physicians would work on a program geared to small businesses.
A stake in the program
Already Physicians is considering future expansion, beginning with a nursing home across the street connected to the hospital by a sky bridge. Their initial workforce will be about 200 strong, but it may be as much as 400 some day. They hope to expand their current board of directors to include an at large community member, and to give their staff a role in running the hospital. “There’s nothing like an employee ownership program to produce not only pride but an incentive for quality work,” O’Leary said.
Staffers may have the chance to purchase stock in the hospital, and staffers already have representation on the Physicians board of directors.
O’Leary herself has Mid-Multnomah County roots; she attended David Douglas School District Schools and became a registered nurse. Frustrated with conventional hospital management, she earned a Masters in Business Administration degree and “developed clinical programs that made sense.”
She received an enthusiastic response from the Opportunity Gateway PAC. Developer Dick Cooley asked for information so that the hospital could be used in efforts to market the district. Neighborhood leaders Arlene Kimura of Hazelwood, Carol Williams of Parkrose Heights and Alesia Reese of Woodland Park all welcomed her. Frieda Christopher of the David Douglas School District said, “Welcome back.”
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