By CARRIE JAMES
The company, Meridian Health Services, recently filed a complaint with the state Department of Health, which is now investigating the matter along with the Internal Affairs Division of the Nassau County Police Department and Nassau University Medical Center.
"An already unsteady NUMC is losing up to 500 patients a month to the ED [emergency department] and over 150 admissions due to NCPD diversion tactics," said Meridian chief executive Kevin Wallis in a letter to the state's Emergency Medical Services administrator.
Wallis also alleged that "trauma patients have been diverted as well as medivac, potentially endangering lives. NCPD EMS members have harassed our crews as well."
Officials for the Civil Service Employees Association, the union which represents the 150 police department ambulance drivers, denied the allegations and said that they come not because of any actual diversion, but because the union filed a grievance shortly after Meridian was hired, said Tony Guistino, CSEA president. The union's grievance stated that union employees could perform the same duties more cost efficiently than Meridian and that union employees had a right to those jobs.
"We have a subsection of our contract which says there should not be an unnecessary contract with an outside provider when it can be provided in house," Guistino said. "We feel we could do as good or better than this company.
"Why would the head of Meridian send this complaint about 911 calls?" he added. "It is my opinion that we brought a grievance we felt was appropriate, and he is retaliating. It has nothing to do with 911 calls."
Nassau Health Care Corporation contracted with Meridian Health Services in July to transport patients between the corporation's facilities, including the hospital, A. Holly Paterson Extended Care Facility and the clinics.
"They were brought in because we needed to provide ambulance service from A. Holly Paterson, clinics and also private doctors who wanted to send their patients here," said Richard Turan, NUMC president and chief executive officer. Turan, who said he had heard reports about a problem, didn't find out about the complaint until after it was filed. "I had heard rumors, and we have now actually begun an investigation."
So far, Turan said the hospital has found no evidence one way or the other about the alleged diversion of patients away from the hospital. Turan added that he's unsure where Wallis' numbers came from regarding a decrease in patients coming into the emergency room.
"Those are not my numbers; I don't know how they came up with those numbers," he said. "There were some months that we were down and other months we were up."
Meridian officials said in a published report that they had concerns and felt obligated to report the alleged diversions to the Department of Health. Ambulances responding to emergencies are supposed to take patients to the nearest hospital, according to state protocol.
"We can look from the windows here at NUMC and see trauma accidents and see them bypass the hospital," said Meridian's regional EMS director Terry Smith, in a published report.
As for now, the three separate investigations into the alleged diversion by Nassau County Police ambulance drivers are ongoing. Guistino said the union will do what it can to help.
The hope for Turan in the future is that any problems will first be brought to his attention before a formal complaint is made.
"When you have a problem, the first thing is to communicate," he said. "That wasn't done here. I found it disturbing that one of our contractors would file a complaint without letting us know about it, and I find it disturbing that an investigator was in our hospital without us knowing about it."
