Regional Medical Center -- the private hospital owned by for-profit company HCA Healthcare -- is walking back the planned closures of its trauma, heart attack and stroke care services which have kept residents alive in that part of town.
San Jose Spotlight reports the company announced Monday it would downgrade its Level 2 trauma center to a Level 3 center. It also says it's "revamping" the acute heart attack program to feature around-the-clock cardiologist availability and a daytime catheterization laboratory.
The stroke center will address the needs of "97 percent of stroke patients," with the remaining cases managed and transferred to acute care providers, the company said.
County Executive James Williams said the hospital's announcement still downgrades trauma, stroke and heart attack services to a dangerous degree, impacting mostly low-income and uninsured residents.
He added the county was not formally consulted by Regional about the changes to its plan and that the hospital has to propose and obtain approval for these plans before announcing them.
Patient advocates said this is not a win for the community. They said they weren't consulted on the announcement either and that a Level 3 trauma center isn't real emergency care and is usually designated for rural area hospitals -- a far cry from the dense urban neighborhoods surrounding Regional.
