Miami County residents can rest assured that upcoming personnel changes at Miami County Medical Center will not result in a reduction of health care services.
On Monday, Miami County Medical Center Chief Operations Officer Jerry Wiesner verified that eight job positions are going to be transferred to Olathe Medical Center as part of an ongoing process. However, he said, the jobs to be transferred are not health care positions, and the medical center will not be reducing its health care services. He also emphasized that no positions are being eliminated.
“I believe eight people are being transferred,” Wiesner said. “We’ve never had layoffs and we never plan to have layoffs. We have jobs available for everyone.”
The positions being transferred to Olathe Health System’s other hospital are business office jobs and, so far, none of the employees involved have refused to make the move.
“We’ve been centralizing our business office for several years. It’s a system-wide initiative to improve our organization,” Wiesner said, adding that centralization of business and accounting functions is not just a trend in the health care industry, but in other industries, too. The reason, he said, is that it increases efficiency and reduces costs.
Health care services at Miami County Medical Center will not be reduced in any way, as a result of these personnel changes, he said. If anything, the changes will help assure that the medical center can continue to provide the best care and most up-to-date technology available.
In fact, Wiesner said, since Miami County Hospital joined Olathe Health System and became Miami County Medical Center in 1996, the facility has doubled both its staff and its health care capabilities.
“We’ve added over 100 procedures and tests, including a full orthopedic program, podiatric surgery and general surgery,” he said.
In addition to inpatient health care, the medical center offers 24-hour emergency care by board-certified emergency physicians, as well as support services such as radiology, laboratory, respiratory therapy, physical therapy, occupational and speech therapy and social services.
Wiesner said even though billing functions will be located in Olathe, Miami County patients need not worry that they won’t be able to obtain answers to their billing questions or that they’ll have to pay long distance rates to do so.
“For patients who have questions with their bills, we’re setting up an 800 number, so they won’t have to call long distance,” he said.
Wiesner said he and other Olathe Health System officials anticipate that the changes will be completed by Feb. 1, 2009.