Officials at Peninsula Hospital in Far Rockaway have announced the hospital is scheduled to reopen its lab services in two weeks, following a state order to suspend lab services due to numerous health and safety concerns. Forum Newsgroup Photo by Luis Gronda.
Nearly two weeks after closing its lab due to a scathing health report from the state, Peninsula Hospital has announced that the lab should be reopening later this month.
A statement the hospital released on March 2 declared that the hospital was taking measures to open its medical labs within the next two weeks.
Lab operations at the hospital have been suspended at the Rockaway-based hospital since last week, following the state Department of Health (DOH) issuing a report citing more than 60 deficiencies in the administration and operations in the clinical labs of the hospital.
Among those deficiencies listed in the report were that the hospital’s labs workers lacked proper training, failed to store blood in the lab at recommended temperatures, did not keep recommended steps to run its microbiology lab, kept expired plasma in the blood bank freezer and failed to secure medical waste.
Following the announcement late last week, Peninsula Hospital announced that they had consented, along with an official committee of unsecured creditors and its lender, Revival Funding, LLC, to appointing an operating trustee in Peninsula’s ongoing bankruptcy case. The hospital filed for bankruptcy last year after Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements were cut.
The trustee—which has not been appointed yet—will assist Peninsula as it attempts to reopen the hospital following DOH’s order to suspend its major operations.
Peninsula also recently issued 240 temporary layoffs to hospital staff in order to save money while the hospital is on diversion. Hospital officials, while reiterating that the layoffs are temporary, have issued no specific time frame for when the 240 hospital staffers will return to work.
Peninsula Hospital CEO Todd Miller released a statement that said the hospital has been working on an action plan to address its lab issues, including revising and updating policies and procedures, ordering upgrades to equipment and maintenance routines and upgrades to staffing.
“Once these initiatives are complete, the hospital is hopeful that the Department of Health will quickly lift the diversion of the hospital through a satisfactory review of our corrective action plan,” Miller stated.
Liz Sullik, a spokeswoman for the hospital, told The Forum Tuesday that the hospital plans to resubmit a new plan to reopen the lab to DOH this week.
While noting that there were “a lot” of deficiencies—including lack of training for hospital personnel— Sulik said only that the hospital was working to address many of those issues.
Among the steps that the hospital was looking to take was initiating new training or re-training for lab employees, as well as new lab procedures—the details of which were not available—and a new, renovated lab featuring brand new equipment. The total costs of the new lab renovations are yet to be determined.
Sulik maintained that while the hospital’s lab is currently still closed, several of its operations were still open, including emergency room for walk-in patients, and several departments such as dental, ophthalmology, radiology, outpatient services and the hospital’s family health center.
On the hospital’s expectation to get out of bankruptcy in May, Sulik said the hospital was very hopeful that they could reopen soon; however it largely depends on the department of health’s approval of their plan.
On whether Peninsula could stick to its time frame of getting out of bankruptcy by mid-spring, Sulik said, “We are still very hopeful.”
By Jean-Paul Salamanca
jp.salamanca@theforumnewsgroup.com
