Fresno’s CRMC hospital will restore top-level trauma services, authorities report
Fresno’s Community Regional Medical Center will not lose its elite designation as a Level I Trauma Center, the Fresno Emergency Medical Services Agency said late Thursday.
The critical status had jeopardized this week after health department officials said the hospital had until 5 p.m. Friday to restore top-level neurosurgical on-call services. Those on-call services were suspended at the hospital last week amid tense contract negotiations between CRMC and the Central California Faculty Medical Group.
In the statement, the Fresno EMS officials said the hospital on Thursday morning reported that “on-call Neurosurgical Services will resume in full operation beginning at 5:00 p.m. on Friday.”
“Thus EMS Agency has stopped any action to suspend Level I Trauma Center designation.”
However, the dispute between CRMC and the CCFMG remained unsolved on Thursday evening.
News of CRMC keeping its status intact came on the heels of an announcement earlier Thursday that the hospital had brought on outside neurosurgeons to temporarily fill in the gaps left by the absence of CCFMG neurosurgeons.
“Two new neurosurgeons are on site today (Thursday) and will begin seeing patients Friday,” CRMC’s Michelle Von Tersch, senior vice president for communications and legislative affairs, said Thursday morning in a bullet-point statement to The Bee.
Lynch said the hospital has brought in a few doctors from Locum, a company that provides short-term and long-term services to hospitals. He said CRMC also retained a local neurosurgeon who will assist with neurosurgical on-call coverage in the evenings.
The hospital plans to bring in two more doctors on Monday or Tuesday, he said.
“They are going to have a group of individuals who are going to take calls on a 24/7 basis,” he said.
From the EMS’s standpoint, he said, his agency needs to make sure the hospital provides those services, whatever the hospital’s specific arrangements.
“They do have some sort of a dispute between CCFMG and the hospital administration,” he said. “We have chosen to stay out of whatever that fight is.”
Lynch said EMS is glad to see critical services will resume.
“This is a great resource for the community, and other hospitals, that’s badly needed in our area,” he said. “It’s going to benefit our entire community and the other hospitals in our area.”
This story was originally published September 10, 2020 at 5:49 PM.
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