Page 41 - BusinessWest January 10, 2022

Mercy Medical Center, like all area hospitals, has seen a series of COVID surges over the past two years, including the current one.
Healthcare
When It Can’t Wait
New Hospital Guidance Clouds Importance of Seeking Medical Care
Last month’s DPH guidance to hospitals, telling them to postpone all non-essential procedures that could result in an inpatient stay, is a challenge on multiple levels, local hospital leaders say. One, it’s not so easy to simply redeploy personnel from one department to another. Two, there’s no one- size-fits-all definition of ‘non-essential.’ But most important, it’s critical that patients seek out the care they need and let doctors make the judgment calls — and the fear is that this new guidance will chase those patients away. It wouldn’t be the first time.
By Joseph Bednar
I
t’s never good to put off necessary treatment, Spiros Hatiras said, whether that be cardiac screenings, lab tests, or cancer surgery.
“The outcome is not going to be good,” said the presi- dent and CEO of Valley Health Systems, which includes
Holyoke Medical Center. Yet, that’s exactly what has happened over the past two years, due to a combination of people’s fear of public places and guidance from the hospitals themselves for people to stay home during the early height of the COVID- 19 pandemic in 2020.
“People were initially scared; they wanted to stay away from the hospital,” Hatiras said. “Then we started reducing capac- ity and told people, essentially, ‘don’t come to the hospital.’ We started seeing people come back over the summer and fall, and now we’re back to telling people to stay away.”
He was referring to the Massachusetts Department of Pub-
HEALTHCARE
JANUARY 10, 2022 41
BusinessWest