A Hospital Divided: Doctors say differences with CEO run too deep

August 6, 2011

Private physicians of the Memorial Hospital of Texas County medical staff, have stepped out even further, by appealing to Texas County Commissioners to hold the MHTC Board of Control accountable for the future of the hospital.
The physicians publicly addressed the Commissioners in a letter published in the Friday, Aug. 5 edition of the Guymon Daily Herald, composed by Dr. Hianto Te and signed and agreed to by eight privately practicing doctors, Dr. Emmauel Barias, Dr. Martin Bautista, Dr. Jeffrey Lim, Dr. Paul Reed, Dr. Sylvia Tan, Dr. Debbie Te, Dr. Hianto Te, as well as Board of Control member, Dr. Kelly McMurry and one doctor employed by MHTC speaking out against her employer for the sake of justice, Dr. Azizeh Asgari.
The doctors maintain their stand that cooperation with the current CEO, Jim Grocholski, is unsustainable and past the point of repair. under his leadership, the financial future and stability of the hospital is doomed for failure.
The past year’s medical Chief of Staff, Dr. Martin Bautista, told the Guymon Daily Herald, “We are done with him, he (Jim) thinks this is political, no, it’s about being responsible stewards. Primarily we are tax paying citizens of Texas County and second, physicians looking after the welfare and financial health of the hospital.”
Bautista summarized the four main financial concerns, currently at hand as:
1. The hospital is losing money year after year. Grocholski confirmed in an interview later in the day, the hospital has in fact been losing money since 2003.
2. Because of the financial strain the hospital faces, hourly employees are the ones suffering with work hours cut, while administrative salaries remain the same.
It was reported, in the case of one hospital employee, hours have been cut down to merely eight hours per week and must seek supplemental employment.
3. The CEO is fighting revenue building, hospital clients, the doctors, referring to the growing controversial issues surrounding the hospital since 2010.
Bautista denies accusations by the CEO of the doctors deliberately not admitting patients to MHTC and said, “The doctors are not boycotting the hospital, we are continuing to admit patients.”
4. Over the course of the past several months, the doctors have repeatedly predicted the CEO will ask the taxpayers for money.
Texas County Commissioner Jack Strain confirmed during the last commissioner’s meeting that Jim Grocholski approached the commissioners with the possibility of needing assistance from Texas County in the future.
“He (Jim) came to make us (the commissioners) more aware of the situation and said if things didn’t turn around, they (the hospital) were going to have to ask for help from the county,” said Strain. “He didn’t actually ask for money this time. I asked him how much money he was talking about and the figure he gave, with the cuts they could make internally and ways to save, would take $700,000 from the county to get them back on track.”
Strain went onto say, “There’s no way the county could come up with that in one lump sum. As a matter of fact there’s no way the county could come up with that kind of money now.”