NUMC board OKs cost-cutting plan

Nassau University Medical Center's board of directors voted unanimously Tuesday to submit a plan to Albany expanding outpatient services and eliminating close to 10 percent of beds as part of a state and federal push to reduce costly hospital stays.

NUMC's proposal, which the hospital hopes will result in a $30-million state grant, also calls for a closer alliance with the North Shore-LIJ Health System and more use of its doctors. To help strengthen its negotiating position with managed care plans, the hospital is also applying to the state to permit it to obtain assistance from North Shore-LIJ.

Board chairman Craig Rizzo called the proposal "an opportunity to be proactive with respect to health care reform."

The deepening relationship with North Shore-LIJ, the country's second largest nonprofit, secular health care system, prompted Jerry Laricchiuta, president of Nassau's Civil Service Employee Association, to closely question NUMC chief executive Arthur Gianelli at the board meeting.

"Where are we going? We are a public benefit corporation," Laricchiuta said.

Laricchiuta said he was concerned the proposal was somehow linked to another plan submitted a year ago to the state Department of Health to create a nonprofit subsidiary that would allow NUMC to hire nonunion employees. "We are not going to allow North Shore to perform our jobs," he said.

But Gianelli repeatedly assured the board the two plans were not related and said the proposal expanding outpatient and primary care services -- to be submitted to the state health department Friday -- could result in an additional 70 jobs. "Either we change with the times or we get left behind," Gianelli said.

Under the plan, the 530-bed hospital would eliminate 50 beds, including 10 inpatient detox and 10 chemical dependency rehabilitation beds. With the state grant, NUMC would then build an expanded primary care area near the emergency department to better manage patients' overall care and to help keep them out of the hospital.

The proposal also calls for a comprehensive outpatient substance abuse program to provide expanded services.Dr. Constantine Ioannou, director of NUMC's substance abuses services, told the board an expanded outpatient program could treat four times the number of patients the hospital now treats in its inpatient unit.