Save Our Hospitals: Future of healthcare in Mahoning Valley with Mercy Health
This week, officials like the mayor of Warren are trying to raise money and healthcare workers are rallying to save the Trumbull Regional Medical Center from closure.
According to Mayor Doug Franklin’s press conference last week in Warren City Council Chambers, the city wants ownership to go to Warren City Hospital.
Warren City Hospital, led by John Guarnieri, and the United Way of Trumbull County seek additional community support and funding to save the medical facilities.
Patients are still being seen at Trumbull Regional Medical Center this week,and the emergency room is open. According to statements made to local TV news outlets, the closure could start “on or around Sept. 19.”
Future of Mahoning Valley’s healthcare, workforce
Mercy Health’s market president Dr. John Luellen provides insight on the future of Mahoning Valley’s medical care.
“From a hiring event perspective, we are offering a number of hiring events. We do that all the time, but we’ve actually ramped that up a bit in response to the recent instability that exists in the healthcare environment in Trumbull County,” said Dr. Luellen.
He said Mercy Health wants to be sure that those who live and have worked in the Mahoning Valley have the opportunity to continue to live and work here.
Since he joined Mercy Health in 2018, Dr. Luellen said the leadership has been responding to available medical services for the growing needs of the community.
“We learned the community needs more access to acute rehab, more access to inpatient behavioral health. The community needs more access to cardiovascular services in Trumbull County,” he said.
These advancements have been ongoing and not in response to Steward Health Care System’s decision to close the local facilities next month, according to Dr. Luellen.
“If you look back a couple of years ago now, we announced that we were going to launch a new inpatient rehab hospital and that’s going to open here in November,” Dr. Luellen said. “About a year and a half ago, we made a similar announcement regarding the the opening of a new behavioral health hospital to expand our capacity to serve the community, and that’s now under construction.”
He said since 2018, they’ve had conversations about expanding cardiac services at St Joe’s Warren hospital to better serve Trumbull County.
“When you look at how some of these things are playing out today, many of those initiatives have been in our pipeline for a long time, some of them for many years, and they’re just really coming to fruition now,” Dr. Luellen said. “It’s important to recognize much of the growth that that we’ve embarked upon isn’t in response to the events of the day today, but it’s really been part of a continuous evaluation of the strategic needs of the community.”
Mercy Health operates three hospitals in the Mahoning Valley, as well as 52 practice locations: the Warren Minor Emergency Services, the Austintown Medical Center and the Howland Medical Center.
Mercy Health also has 10 walk-in health care sites and an urgent care center located at 1950 Niles Cortland Road NE in Warren.
For more information on upcoming events and to browse open jobs, visit Mercy Health’s website..
Healthcare workers rally
The SEIU District 1199 union represents healthcare workers across Ohio and at the Steward Trumbull Regional Medical Center.
They plan to hold a rally at 7 p.m. Thursday outside of the hospital at East Market Street and Homewood Avenue Southeast outside of Steward Trumbull Hospital in Warren.
They’re assembling to show it’s critical that the hospital be saved to ensure workers are able to continue to serve their community uninterrupted, according to Becky Williams, president of SEIU 1199.
“Steward needs to be responsible and pick up their own tab, instead of burdening our community with it. Their mismanagement will reduce access to quality care in our community, said Williams. “Steward’s debt is their own problem to solve, not our community’s. Workers and our community should not be left hanging out to dry so that they can dig themselves out of the debt they knowingly accrued.”
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