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by Dee Strandvold (Dee1crip [at] aol.com)
Summit Hospital in Oakland closed the Pain Clinic, dumping 2ooo patients! These patients are being told to go to Stanford. These are Cronic pain patients. That is too far to travel and too expensive.
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Thursday, August 22, 2002
By Dee Strandvold


SUMMIT’S LIES UNCOVERED BY PAINFIGHTERS


Sutter's Alta Bates-Summit Medical Center continues to stonewall! These self-righteous nitwits have the nerve to say they care about their patients. Yet, in the same breath they say that they lost $60 million last year and therefore, they MUST close the Pain Clinic. They seem surprised by the fact that most of the patients are on Medicare and/or Medical. "The hospital is complaining that 60% of Pain clinic patients are on Medicaid or Medicare....what do they expect??? Of course they are! They're too disabled to work! Chronic pain always comes along with other serious medical condition such as MS, SCI, etc, etc, etc…" says David Berg of Modern Maturity Magazine. (Pain Online-painonline.org). Sutter knew this five years ago, when they opened the AB-Summit Pain Clinic. Yet now they expect us to believe that they are surprised.

We patients were once, for the most part, working members of society. We deserve to be treated as such. AB-Summit is saying that if you are hurt and become disabled, you cease to be a respected member of society. You don't get urgently needed medical treatment anymore.

This company is not losing money. Not without ENRON's accountants. How much of that $60 million deficit can they DIRECTLY blame on the Pain Clinic? How much of that is from Workers' Compensation claims, which they have written off, knowing they can still go back and recover? <From an anonymous source within the Clinic> How much is AB-Summit's cut of the $210 million that its parent-company, Sutter, made in the last two years? And last, and perhaps most significant, where is the $16.5 million in revenues that the Alta Bates Summit Medical Center Foundation collected last year?

Why was the abovementioned Foundation’s money not used to cover the shortfall of the Pain Clinic? They have $16.5 million in their coffers. What are they waiting for? I contacted the AB-Summit Foundation to ask the following: Where does the Foundation money come from? Who decides where the money goes? And, how is the money generally spent? The AB-Summit Foundation office at Summit Hospital said they could not, or would not, help me. So, I contacted the spokesperson for AB-Summit, Carolyn Kemp. She said the money comes from ex-patients, other Foundations, etc. Donors sometimes ask, for instance, that their money be used for a specific department, the rest is used for the hospital in general.

When a department needs money, i.e., for updating, they must present a plan to an "administrative team" who then either accept or reject the plan. If accepted, the plan then goes to the AB-Summit Board of Directors to be voted on. Also, once a year, the Board looks at the department with the "greatest need." Greatest need? Did I miss something…or did they? In another article, Kemp stated "The service is desperately needed by patients but (is) underfunded.”<Sic> (West County Times (8-16-02) Michal Lando) wouldn't this be the "department with the greatest need?" However, an un-named MD was heard to say that the Pain Clinic was not even on the list of departments.

According to Michelle Rousey, a Pain Clinic patient, with a chronic breathing illness “We need to go higher than the insurance carriers! We need to get the people in charge (i.e. government officials, politicians, etc.). Get them to be on our side, to say ‘Yes, these People deserve to live’. And ‘Yes, they need our help!!'. And ‘HOW can WE help them?!!!"

An email from Sandra Weese of SEIU local 250 informs me that the Federal Trade Commission is planning to increase its focus on past hospital mergers… to ensure that the arrangements "have actually benefited patients" and not simply resulted in higher profits. This is from the New York Times. (8-9-02) To add your name to the list of complaints, go to http://www.federaltradecommission.com, find and fill out the Consumer Complaint form. The FTC also suggested we go to the California Attorney General's website http://www.ag.ca.gov, go to "Contact Us." Then, find and fill out the Consumer Complaint Form there, too. The hospital is Alta Bates- Summit Medical Center, Summit Campus, 350 Hawthorne Dr., Oakland, CA, 94609. (510) 655-4000. Both the FTC and the AG's offices' said "The more, the better." I urge everyone who would like to help the Painfighters that this is a great way to do so. Let's get the FTC and the Attorney General to examine AB-Summit's actions and motives.

I don't know if anyone will ever see this, but, if they do, I pray the Federal Trade Commission crawls up the Sutter's posterior and finds a heart. I doubt they will find one, however. Those twits that represent AB-Summit have parroted the same thing over and over, without one ounce of proof or explanation. "AB-Summit lost $60 million last year, so we MUST cut the Pain Clinic." This is their cry. According to an anonymous MD, "Sutter just does not want to be in the Pain business”. But I have found evidence that the only business Sutter doesn't want seems to be Oakland's!

The proof comes from, none other than, Sutter Healthcare, itself. Sutter has, at present, (4) four open Pain Clinics. There is a Pain Management Clinic at Sutter Tracy Community Hospital in Tracy, Sutter Delta Medical Center in Antioch, Peninsula Medical Center in Burlingame and Mills Health Center in San Mateo. ALL of them accept Medicare and/or Medicaid. None of these are being closed.

According to http://www.sutterhealth.org/programs/pain_mgmt.html,. Sutter's Tracy Pain Management Clinic “is one of the few medical facilities in San Joaquin County to offer epidural steroid injection using fluoroscopy. Calling on years of advanced training and experience, our specialists will work with you to find the medication or combination of medications that will give you maximum pain relief.” This could have been written about the threatened AB-Summit Pain Clinic. Pain is everywhere; however, the only remaining Pain Clinics are in well-heeled, white, suburban areas.

On August 1, 2002, the Oakland City Council, as well as other state and local elected officials held a hearing. Before the hearing, the Painfighters held a Rally in the Courtyard of City Hall. Coincidentally, Mayor Jerry Brown held a rally for more Cops for Oakland. As he left, he told Leona Simms, <a long-time Oakland resident and patient of the Pain Clinic> that only if she would support him, on the more Cops issue, would he support her and the “Painfighters.” Is this how cheap he thinks the lives of these patients are? The Mayor could not be reached for comment.

At this hearing the patients and the public were allowed to comment on why or why not the AS-Summit Pain Clinic should be re-opened. Tears flowed as the patients told of the horrible pain they suffered, as well as, the help they received at the Pain Clinic. They told of lives re-gained and the horror of finding out that this Salvation had been ripped from them. The representatives of AB-Summit, Warren Kirk and Dr Andrew Robertson, sat coldly and heartlessly by, watching. When they stood, they uttered the same line…”AB-Summit lost $60 million last year and therefore we MUST close the Pain Clinic.” I wonder if they realize how ludicrous this sounds when human lives are at stake. It became even more ludicrous after a representative from SEIU, the hospital workers’ union, showed us that in addition to millions of dollars in tax breaks from their non-profit status, the Sutter Corporation made over $210 million in profits over the last two years! One patient was so traumatized; she attempted suicide three times last month. This is inhumane! I guess human lives are just not very important to them. Maybe it is just THESE lives that don’t count? Maybe if they were still able to work…

DEMONSTRATION!!!

Dig out your marching shoes! Join the Painfighters, WEAP (Women’s Economic Agenda Project) and PPEHRC (Poor Peoples’ Economic Human Rights Campaign) for a demonstration at 3100 Summit Street, the South Entrance of Summit Hospital, across from the Parking Garage, on Labor Day, Monday, September 2, 2002 at 11:30 a.m. Let’s show them that Oakland citizens deserve a Pain Clinic! Many of us were born in these hospitals, they are OUR hospitals, and we need them to meet our needs now, more than ever! WEAP and PPEHRC are honoring the Painfighters by ending their eight day Save the Soul of America campaign at Summit Hospital to aim the spotlight on this latest theft of our health care rights and to help us save our Pain Clinic. Help us thank and support them by turning out in a big way!

To join the Painfighters, call Leona Sims at 652-3388 (SIMS544 [at] AOL.com), or Dee Strandvold at 601-7794 (Dee1crip [at] aol.com).
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