Boston Medical Center Plans Layoffs

Hospital looks to save $61 million after budget cuts

Boston Medical Center will lay off 250 employees, cut $14 million in nonsalary expenses, and end its relationship with Quincy Medical Center in an effort to save $61.5 million, the hospital announced yesterday.

The reduction effort, which came in response to recent cuts in state supplemental payments for Medicaid and other patients, includes eliminating the equivalent of 130 full-time positions, which will save $10.5 million. The clinical service areas affected are obstetrics, primary care, pediatrics, family medicine, geriatrics, laboratory, radiology, nursing, endoscopy, urology, and ophthalmology. Interpreter services, dietary services, information technology, public safety, finance, and administration will lose staff as well.

Elaine Ullian, BMC’s chief executive officer, says that under next year’s proposed budget cuts, the state government will pay Boston Medical Center only 64 cents for every dollar it costs to provide care to low-income patients.

“When the state made the recent cuts to close the budget gap and the administration cut Medicaid and health-care funds as much as they did, Boston Medical Center felt more than its fair share of the pain,” Ullian says. “More than 50 percent of BMC’s patients are low-income, and they are the people who are most hurt by any reduction in access or services.”

Other cutbacks include reducing $14 million in nonsalary expenses, such as support to physicians, insurance coverage, and existing contractual relationships, over the next two years, and saving $2 million by eliminating the hospital’s support of Quincy Medical Center as of June 30, 2009. The hospital also plans to cut capital spending by at least 35 percent and defer several major projects to save $35 million.

Ellen Berlin, the director of corporate communications at BMC, says that future cuts are likely, even though the hospital is operating at nearly full capacity and seeing record numbers of patients. Hospital officials plan to work with the state in an effort to find alternative funding sources.

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There are 5 comments on Boston Medical Center Plans Layoffs

  2. When will the patients know who is leaving BMC?
    Will BMC assist us in finding new doctors?
    How will patients feel the effect of the layoffs?
    Will we have to wait 6 months to see our physicians?
    This is very worrisome news.

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  4. The truth is that 64 cents on the dollar of costs is likely better than most private insurers pay. BMC has for many years taken advantage of the state’s free care pool to stuff its coffers. They typically inflate their costs 3 times and then present this “bill” to the free care pool which typically paid them the entire amount without question. This is how when in the late 90’s everyone was losing money (BIDMC lost 54M) BMC was building a metropolis. Other tactics they have used to bilk the citizens of this state included “pushing” patients to apply for free care threatening that they “might not qualify” for medicare or other programs. I know this as many patients I treated told me this first hand after I asked why, when they had a job and could work, had they opted for freecare. Because I am a private practice doctor, (and not on salary there) I would receive no income for my professional services, whereas the hospital actually makes out very well on the technical component. So although the mission of treating all people equally is well and good, the fact is that the hospital would rather keep high-reimbursing/high cost procedures for few by keeping highly paid specialists on the payroll than pay primary care docs and pediatricians who would in the long run make the biggest savings for the community.

    There is a sad disconnect in that the hospitals are rewarded for doing more procedures rather than providing better care. So if you only need one procedure but have an incompetent physician who might take 3 times to get it right (little bit now, little later and the final, definitive procedure after that) instead of doing the definitive procedure first, that incompetent physician (and the hospital) are actually rewarded at three times the rate of the senior doc who did it right the first time!

    It’s high time the public demand “full disclosure” and transparency, and that benchmarks be set at BMC.

    In other words, what DO YOU GET FOR 64cents at BMC, vs 64cents at the Brigham??

    Honest Abe once said it long ago and it applies equally well today: “let the people know the facts and the country will be safe”.

    I wonder if the Chaiman of the Board of Trustees is familiar with President Lincoln’s saying.

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