In the near future, two significant signs that East Ohio Regional Hospital really is reopening soon will be the hiring of more than 200 employees for Phase One and the fact that the medical records for former patients soon will be in hand in Martins Ferry.
Chief Operating Officer Bernie Albertini recently explained on The Watchdog (98.1 FM WKKX and 97.7 FM WVLY) that Alecto Ohio soon will send the medical records the company obtained when purchasing EORH and the Ohio Valley Medical Center. The records will be made available in two weeks, and former patients will be able to communicate with hospital employees via telephone or online.
“When we first initiated this venture, medical records were, of course, an important topic,” Albertini said. “We also believe that those medical records need to be here and not based out in California. We are now in the final negotiations with Alecto to obtain those records and to retain them locally. That’s what would be best for everyone involved.
“That means when you come to East Ohio Regional Hospital, we will have your records right here on-site,” he confirmed. “What I hope doesn’t happen is a mad rush because everyone wants their records right then and there. They will be available, and we will develop a system for people to get their records, and I do expect us to have that process wrapped up by next week.”
Individuals submitting record requests will have the option of obtaining them on a thumb drive or a paper copy.
“Once we have finalized everything with the former provider here in Martins Ferry, we will put out a press release that explains how the people can obtain their records,” Albertini explained. “More than likely, there will be a phone number people can call and an email address to send those requests.
“The important thing to know right now is that we will have the records, and they will be readily available,” he continued. “I know a lot of people have had to go through a lot of different steps while trying to get their medical records, and we look forward to those processes becoming very, very easy.”
J-O-B-S
The executive team at EORH has been hired, beginning with the process of staffing the emergency room, the hospital, and all of the associated services necessary. For Phase One at EORH, approximately 200 employees will be needed on the first day of operation.
“We will be hiring soon and that is why it’s important for our Human Resources director to come on board this week,” Albertini said. “We are working on getting the benefits package all together, too, and once everything is in place, we will be hiring people for a lot of different positions.
“It will be a cascade of positions now that we have our executive team together, and the next hires will be our directors,” he said. “That’s when they will begin hiring the individuals who will work in each of the departments. In the beginning, I can see us hire as many as a couple of hundred individuals who will be here on that very first day.”
Following Phase One, the drug and alcohol treatment as well as the psychiatric unit will follow.
“The emergency room and the hospital will open first, and then we will open the drug and alcohol unit and psychiastric unit, as well as the continuous care facility,” Albertini explained. “I don’t see us having as many employees as we did just a few years ago because we have combined some positions, and some positions have been eliminated because of technological advances over the last few years.
“When we have everything operational, I would estimate we would have between 400-500 employees,” he said. “We will get to that point in the near future, but this is all quite the process so we can be 100 percent positive that we can serve the way a hospital should.”
Reopening and Survival?
Renovations to the “guts” of the facility have started with the replacement of the chiller system, and so has design and engineering work on the new mental health and addiction recovery units. Once prepared for inspection, EORH will need to be inspected by both federal and state agencies to ensure everything from safety to treating Medicare carriers.
“We still do not have a formal date for the opening of the hospital, but we are well on our way to making that happen. Most of the work that is needed has to be completed well before our reopening because of the inspections that we have to have first before the first patient walks through that door,” Albertini explained. “It’s all about keeping people safe when they are here at the hospital, and that means there are a lot of tests that have to be conducted on things like the fire alarms, all of the doors, and all of the equipment that a hospital needs. But once we get all of it completed and inspected, we’re looking forward to opening to serve the people in the Upper Ohio Valley.”
But if one healthcare company couldn’t keep the doors open, why should anyone believe Albertini, owner Dr. John Johnson, and the hired staff can for the long-term? Well, East Ohio Hospital LLC inherited no debt from Alecto, and while doing business as East Ohio Regional Hospital, Albertini will not employ what he refers to the “California model” for the healthcare business.
“One of the things we are looking at right now are the utility costs, and what’s been developed is far more efficient than what has been inside these buildings for a very long time. It’s obvious to us that Alecto did not do that,” Albertini said. “Also, we are developing ways to increase the revenue coming in by adding services that have not been here at East Ohio before.
“When the work is completed, we’ll have a 16-bed unit for psychiatric care, and we’ll also have 50 beds in our drug and alcohol unit that will offer a 30-day program,” he said. “Those units are very much needed here in the Upper Ohio Valley, so we are looking forward to offering those services in the future. So, what we’ll doing here in Martins Ferry is a completely different business model than what Alecto had, and we’re local people who know what our residents need.”
