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As Mission Health breaks ground in Franklin, service concerns linger
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As Mission Health breaks ground on the new Angel Medical Center, some in Franklin feel a new hospital won t address the health care issues in a community that s seen years of dwindling services.
On April 30, Mission broke ground on its new $68 million, 30-bed Angel Medical Center, which will replace the current hospital that opened in 1974.
Linda Tyler, a public health nurse in Macon County for 25 years who s now retired, is among those who don t think a new hospital will cure what ails the area s health care.
She said like a lot of small hospitals, Angel Medical Center wasn t perfect, but folks there would work hard to make sure there was enough staffing and that people could get the services they needed.
Concerns go unanswered during HCA monitor meeting
The public had a lot of questions during an April 7 virtual meeting regarding Mission Health’s services and operations since being bought by for-profit HCA Healthcare in 2019. Unfortunately, Gibbins Advisors the independent monitor hired to ensure HCA fulfills its contractual obligations couldn’t provide them with many answers.
While the team of healthcare experts and accountants with Gibbins Advisors say they are continuously monitoring HCA operations at Mission-affiliated hospitals in Western North Carolina, their contractual scope is limited to the 15 commitments outlined in the purchase agreement between Mission and HCA, which was ultimately signed off on by Attorney General Josh Stein.
When life as we knew it slammed to a sudden stop in mid-March of 2020, the novel coronavirus from Wuhan hadn’t yet infected a single resident of Western North Carolina, but with the virus continually expanding its territory since the United States’ first confirmed case on Jan. 21, 2020, it seemed only a matter of time.
Buncombe County confirmed its first case March 16 the patient was a visitor from New York who then traveled to Macon County to isolate followed by Cherokee County March 18. A part-time resident of Jackson County tested positive on March 23, and Haywood County reported its first cases on April 2. Testing from the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians confirmed the first cases in Swain and Graham counties on April 25 and 26.
In a pandemic, it s not surprising that health care jobs would be plentiful, as demand for services continues to rise. But the region s hospitals have a lot of openings for health care workers. A lot.
Mission Health, which operates six hospitals in the mountains, including Mission Hospital in Asheville, had 828 openings systemwide and 637 in Asheville as of March 5, according to spokeswoman Nancy Lindell. That includes 354 full- and part-time nursing positions and 72 certified nursing aide positions.
The need for employees has spurred Mission to create a new state-approved CNA training program at Mission Hospital and its Highlands-Cashiers Hospital location, as well as a new program to help recent nursing graduates adjust to work at the hospital.