First Hospital and their affiliated outpatient facilities are planned to close, Commonwealth Health has announced. It’s been informed that the primary reason for this is the lack of employees and the hospital is unable to accept new patients due to a riot that broke out.
It was alarming that first hospital closed its doors, more concerning is the list of programs and services that are affected by this decision. This includes outpatient services and counselling for patients suffering from mental health disorders, intellectual disabilities and abused disorders. Commonwealth has not yet informed where the patients would be transferred.
State rep Pashinski stated that they require the facts and truth. Without a contingency plan, how can a facility with 5000 patients would just close down. Patients in the area would have to travel hours for treatment, as they have no proper facility close by.
First hospital has been riddled with scandal last year. In May a riot broke out, that resulted in relocating 5 patients to another hospital for treatment. At about the same time a former employee was accused and arrested for strangling a 14-year-old patient inside the facility.
Public records indicate, together with the department of justice, investigations have shown that community health systems, the parent company of Commonwealth health have been in trouble with fines over half a billion dollars since 2000, with offences of fake claims and wage violations.
Funds allocated for stall retention and bonuses that has not been accounted for, in spite of numerous requests, said state representative Aaron Kaufer.
At a press conference, first hospital employees who wanted to speak out, were not allowed as they would lose their jobs.
Emergency room services at Tyler Memorial Hospital in Tunkhannock were closed down, and filed plans to consolidate two of their hospitals in Seranton.
