Pediatric hospitalist program alterations slated at Phoebe

ALBANY — Officials at Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital confirmed Monday evening that alterations are being made to the pediatric hospitalist arrangement involving Phoebe and Albany Area Primary Health Care, prompting some concern from at least one pediatrician’s office that has chosen not to participate.

Phoebe officials said that, starting Sept. 1, AAPHC pediatric hospitalists will be on-site at Phoebe during daytime hours Monday-Friday. During nighttime and weekend hours, nurse practitioners and family medicine residents doing pediatric rotations will be on duty in the hospital, and backed up by on-call pediatricians from AAPHC and any other health care groups that choose to participate in the program.

“As a nonprofit community health center, AAPHC made the decision to alter the pediatric hospitalist program to ensure financial sustainability and adequate physician coverage,” AAPHC CEO Shelley Spires said. “Therefore, we are working with Phoebe and other local pediatricians to ensure our community maintains around-the-clock pediatric emergency and inpatient care.”

Phoebe’s pediatric hospitalist program has been operated by AAPHC for close to three years. Staffed solely by AAPHC pediatricians and supported financially by both AAPHC and Phoebe, officials said the service has been offered as a benefit to all pediatric health care providers at no charge or contribution.

Phoebe officials said the new arrangement is a standard model at many similar-sized hospitals. There are pediatricians who do not want to take part, among them the providers at Southwest Georgia Pediatrics.

The practice, which said it has used the hospitalist service for its admitted non-newborn patients for about two years, issued a letter to the families it serves earlier this month informing them that the service is being discontinued and that there are no immediate or future plans to re-institute it.

The practice has made the decision to direct its patients to Macon for inpatient care. One of the concerns it cites is that the new arrangement does not consistently allow for immediate access to a pediatric hospitalist at Phoebe.

“Due to our concern for the future of local pediatric care for our patients and secondary to the current instability/uncertainty of said care, we have considered several options for our future inpatient care,” the letter said. “As a result, we believe our patients will be best served through the pediatric hospitalist service at Navicent Healthcare in Macon, GA. This service offers excellent management by pediatric hospitalists who are immediately available at the bedside on a 24/7 basis. Additionally, Navicent Healthcare has access to a variety of pediatric specialists including: surgery, neurology, gastroenterology, hematology/oncology, endocrinology, pulmonary and the pediatric intensive care. Access to pediatric procedures that are not available locally is also very important component in this decision.

“Navicent Healthcare not only represents a proven, stable pediatric program with an excellent reputation, but they are actively planning to improve their services by expanding and building a free-standing pediatric hospital over the next 3-5 years. Our discussions with the Navicent group have been very encouraging, and we are more than comfortable with this new arrangement. We are confident that this is how our patients can be best served. Unfortunately, Macon is not as convenient for hospital admissions, and we understand this will be more difficult for our families. However, we truly believe this difficulty in distance is more than offset by the superior quality and improved safety of care provided, especially in light of uncertainty and changes in future pediatric inpatient care locally.”

The letter goes on to say that the practice will not be able to see its patients at Navicent, but that its staff will remain in touch with providers there concerning patients admitted to the hospital. It also states that the practice will provide follow-up care after discharge, and that there are no plans for Southwest Georgia Pediatrics to discontinue its newborn care at Phoebe.

Phoebe officials said the hospital and AAPHC will remain committed to providing quality health care to children, and that the partnership with Phoebe, AAPHC and other pediatricians will allow children to be served 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

“As we have for more than 100 years, Phoebe will continue to provide facilities and resources to assist physicians in caring for their patients who require hospitalization,” said Phoebe Chief Medical Officer Dr. Steve Kitchen. “We will continue to work with AAPHC and other community pediatricians to ensure pediatric patients get the highest quality emergency and inpatient care they need.”

Phoebe is also host to full-time pediatric cardiologist Dr. Ben Toole of the Sibley Heart Center, a division of Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, while outpatient pediatric sub-specialty care is also available through Phoebe’s partnership with the Medical College of Georgia.