The need for better medical care predates Solaris acquiring and moving to close Muhlenberg. Long before hospital closings, there was an acknowledged need for more non-emergency health care. We have to think beyond restoring the status quo and work to meet our needs in the most modern and effective way possible.Muhlenberg can become a viable engine for wellness in Central Jersey, economically sustainable by adapting to current market trends and social issues.
Recent hearings revealed that ambulatory clinics are taking profit-making business away from hospitals. Many hospitals run varied assortments of ambulatory clinics. Muhlenberg could offer a general medicine clinic for extended hours, backed up with specialty clinics, reducing the burden on all area emergency rooms while still providing the continuity of care and preventive medicine necessary to improve health and lower costs.
In addition to the fundamental clinic, patients would be drawn to specialty clinics that would embrace integrative medicine and help patients maintain the diet, exercise and activities that promote health.
Similar to a magnet school, integrative medicine would attract patients and provide better care to a community dealing with many conditions that respond to preventive medicine and lifestyle changes.
Clinics at Robert Wood Johnson already have a long waiting list for appointments. Would the state medical school be willing to help establish similar services at Muhlenberg?
Starting with diabetes, hypertension, obesity and addiction, we could easily expand to under-served specialties, especially multiple sclerosis, HADD and autism. All of these areas are prime candidates for foundation funding and clinical trials using alternative medicine protocols.
A decade ago, I envisioned a health-care prevention and maintenance cooperative that would provide affordable access to supplements, healthy food and a host of popular alternative medicine treatments in return for participation in clinical trials necessary to validate or disprove their effectiveness.
Funding is increasingly available to investigate promising medical protocols, even when no one has the ability to profit through a patient.
Deborah Dowe
DNV.Dowe@Verizon.net
How do you subvert a nonprofit corporation? Infiltrate the board, deny or even change the mission. Intentionally neglect maintenance of any property to justify demolition and make way for the developers. Muhlenberg Hospital's closing taught us that the most heavily endowed nonprofits, with control of prime real estate, are most vulnerable to special interests taking over control of the board.
No comments:
Post a Comment