Carilion CEO talks about hospital criticism and patient care

By Karen McNew
WSLS10 Anchor
Published: October 14, 2008

The CEO of Carilion Clinic responds to the negative attention the health care provider has been receiving recently.

The negative attention started back in August when an article about Carilion was published in The Wall Street journal.  The article stated the non-profit is a monopoly.

Then last month, WSLS broke the story about the death of a mental health patient at Roanoke Memorial hospital in July, raising questions about care.

Carilion has no doubt expanded over the last few years CEO Dr. Edward Murphy has been there for the last ten, so he’s overseen many of those changes.  There have been several meetings including one involving The Citizens Coalition for Responsible Healthcare have called Carilion a monopoly and called for Carilion to make changes to the money it charges patients for services.

Karen:  The perception is that Carilion is buying up all of these different practices… that is the perception… that “I” have to go to a Carilion place.

Dr. Murphy: Let’s handle the Center for Advanced Imaging Separately.

He says the owner of the center came to Carilion wanting to sell and the option made sense for them. At the CCRH meeting State Senator John Edwards suggested a meeting between the two groups.

Karen:  Have you all had the opportunity to sit down and have that meeting?

Dr. Murphy:  We’ve not heard from them.

As for the hospital taking over doctors offices Dr. Murphy says, that’s not the way it works.

Dr. Murphy says, “The last thing you would ever want to do is bring people into the group who aren’t anxious to be a part of it.“

Karen: Does Carilion encourage its doctors to keep referrals in house?

Dr. Murphy:  Certainly we do and because we think it is better for the patients and the doctors when we do but encourage is the exactly right word.

Dr. Murphy says that there are no mandates within the hospital for referrals but did say now and in years past, when a doctor refers a patient outside the system a meeting will be held to ask why that option was best and what could be done to make Carilion the best option.

After a patient committed suicide inside the ER here and due to an increase in psych patients being admitted and treated in the ER for hours at a time, Dr. Murphy says inside there are new units that have locks similar to an actual psychiatric unit. 10 On Your Side is told those units are rarely empty.

As for the patient wait inside the ER Dr. Murphy admits he’s heard the good with the bad and hopes a new fast track system will cut everyone’s wait in the future.

That fast track system will allow patients to be divided into two categories, urgent care and those who are more critical.  The idea is to get patients taken care of more efficiently.