SCOTT & WHITE DROPS ER RATING TO LEVEL-FOUR

  

Recently Scott & White-Brenham’s emergency room underwent a downgrade from a level-3 to a level-4 facility.

As a part of this move, two surgeons are no longer on 24-hour call at Scott & White for such things as massive trauma cases in the emergency room.

Scott & White-Brenham administrator Michael Pittman said he could not address specific patients or doctors due to confidentiality concerns, but he did talk about the recent decision to go to a level-4 center.

Pittman says one of the factors is the number of available personnel in a 24-hour period.  He also said the decision was not strictly a financial one, “you have to have 24/7 orthopedic coverage.  At this time we only have one orthopedic surgeon that is on call.  Therefore, we cannot meet the criteria for level-three.

“It’s the same with general surgery.  We cannot provide the 24/7 on-call time that would meet that.”

Pittman went on to say that it’s not just trauma but other aspects of care, “so, this wasn’t financial.  We said ‘this is what we can do very well, so that’s what we’re going to be, a level-four’”.

Pittman says that in most severe cases only a level-one or a level-two facility is equipped to handle that case.

He says there’s no difference between a level-three and a level-four center in the case of massive trauma, such as a gunshot wound or critical accident injuries, “a gunshot wound takes a lot of resources…a certain amount of blood bank, staff and other things.”

“We would basically stabilize the patient and send them to the appropriate level of care.  A four can do it as well as a (level) three.  Major and severe trauma will always be transported to a higher level of care.”

Pittman went on to say that the Washington County EMS is one of the finest in the area and in cases where they know Scott & White cannot handle a certain case, they will transport to another facility that is equipped to handle that situation.