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Hospital Workers Stage Final Rally: Doors Closed at Midnight

Posted on: Thursday, 13 April 2006, 06:00 CDT

By Anne Danahy, The Centre Daily Times, State College, Pa.

Apr. 13--RUSH TOWNSHIP -- Hours before the Philipsburg Area Hospital closed its doors for good Wednesday night, a crowd of staff and supporters gathered on the institution's lawn to say they had struggled to keep it open and would continue fighting to bring it back.

"You guys gave your blood, you gave your sweat, you gave your tears to this hospital," said union director Mickey Sgro to cheers and applause from a crowd of several hundred people. "You were going to make concessions to this hospital to keep it open for this community. And that's what this is -- a community hospital."

The hospital, which filed for bankruptcy in January, announced Monday that it would be shutting down at midnight Wednesday. CEO Michael Loomis said Tuesday that low reimbursements for medical care, rising costs such as fuel and trouble recruiting doctors to the area were some of the problems the hospital faced.

Loomis also said the employees' unions had not made enough concessions, an idea that drew the wrath of speakers at the rally. Union representatives said workers had been willing to make sacrifices, including pay cuts and laying off 26 employees. Some in the crowd held signs supporting the union and others whistled and cheered during the speeches, which put the blame for the closing on the administration and the board.

"The union is the one that tried to keep this hospital open, not management," said Gina Burge, president of the 42-member union that represents nurses.

"We're not going to go without a fight," Sgro said.

This is not the first time the hospital has closed. It was shut down as a state institution for about 18 months, before being reopened in the early 1990s.

Pam Hendershot, a registered nurse in the short procedure unit, and Janice Faust, an LPN, said they worked at the hospital when it closed the first time and they think it can be reopened.

"It's a viable institution," Hendershot said.

Her daughter, an LPN, was working the final shift until midnight in the emergency room Wednesday as the rally went on outside.

"When she leaves tonight, they'll lock the door behind her," Hendershot said. "She's having a rough time."

"Last time we had 30 days. This time we had 48 hours," Faust said of the advance notice they were given. She had worked at the hospital since 1968.

Union leaders said they will look for ways to get the hospital reopened. Sgro said politicians need to get involved.

In the meantime, employees said they have started looking for new jobs or plan to take some time off.

Gordon Milliron, an LPN in the medical surgical unit, lost his job when Murata closed. He went back to school for a year to become an LPN.

"I'm upset," he said. "There are a lot of good friends here."

"Patients became family too with us. We knew how to treat them," said his co-worker Betty Renninger, a registered nurse.

Debbie Bell, a certified nursing assistant, said hospital staff knew the patients by name.

"You weren't a number or a statistic," she said. "You were a person."

Now she is concerned about her mother and other elderly people in the Philipsburg area who will have to travel almost 20 miles to get to a hospital.

"That 15 minutes could be a matter of life or death," she said. "That's what's scary."

Anne Danahy can be reached at 231-4648.

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Centre Daily Times, State College, Pa.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: Centre Daily Times (State College, Pa.)

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