By John Howell Sr.

Tri-Lakes Medical Center expects to reopen its six-bed intensive care unit (ICU) this year and recruit “at least nine physicians during 2012,” Wes Sigler said Tuesday.

Sigler is chief executive officer at Tri-Lakes and spoke at the Batesville Rotary Club’s weekly meeting.
The 2012 physician recruitment is part of an effort to add 25 to 30 new physicians “in all different types of specialties” in the community during the next three or four years, Sigler said.

Targeted specialties include “OB physicians, pediatric physicians, internal medicine, primary care-type physicians in additioanl to specialists like general surgery and cardiology,” he said.

Anesthesiologist Dr. Christine Waldrup who will be joining Tri-Lakes in late March, Sigler continued. The new physicians will join Dr. Katherine Pannell and Dr. Cedric Edwards, psychiatrist and internist, respectively, who came to the facility late last year.

New physicans also trigger the need for more space, systems and equipment, Sigler continued, prompting the hospital’s ongoing negotiations to purchase land for medical office construction adjacent to the west campus facility. In-house kidney dialysis will be added to allow treatment of patients with renal disease, imaging services will be upgraded, surgical services will be expanded, and behavioral services will be expanded to include intensive outpatient services, he said.

Sigler came to Tri-Lakes as CEO last spring after the hospital’s physician owners sold an interest in the facility to Health Management Associates (HMA), which owns 66 hospitals, including 10 in Mississippi. The physician-owners retained an ownership interest, making it “somewhat of a unique facility,” Sigler said, in that there are “only a few hundred partially-physician-owned hospitals in the whole country.”
Licensed for 130 beds, the hospital currently operates 112 beds with 55 beds on the main campus, three labor and delivery rooms and eight beds in the emergency department, the hospital CEO said. There are 57 beds on the behavioral health campus with 25 designated for adult psychiatric treatment, 22 for geriatric psychiatric treatment and ten for chemical dependency treatment.

Admissions to both campuses average 275 monthly, “obviously something we want to grow, but a pretty good basis,” Sigler said.

About 135 surgical procedures are performed at Tri-Lakes each month, the emergency room treats about 1,300 patients during that period, and about two dozen babies are delivered at Tri-Lakes monthly.

Tri-Lakes utilizes the equivalent of 350 full-time employees whose payroll totals $12 million annually, Sigler said. As a for-profit corporation, the hospital pays about $275,000 each year in city and county property taxes and another $20,000 for sales tax paid on purchases.

The hospital also provides about $4 million annually in indigent care, he said, either for patients with no medical insurance coverage or Medicare or Medicaid benefits or for insured patients unable to pay the difference between their coverage and hospital costs.

Press Ganey Associates Inc. has named Tri-Lakes Medical Center a 2011 Top Improver Award winner, its CEO announced.

Press Ganey currently partners with more than 10,000 health care facilities — including 50 percent of all U.S. hospitals — to measure and improve the quality of care that providers deliver to patients and, ultimately, to improve the overall health care experience.

The Press Ganey award recognizes clients who have shown continuous improvement over two years. Tri-Lakes is one of 36 Press Ganey client facilities to receive this honor. It is one of 18 to receive it for improvement in patient satisfaction scores, as measured by comparing quarterly scores, with improved scores in three of the four eligible periods.

“We are proud partners of Tri-Lakes Medical Center,” said Robert Draughon, CEO of Press Ganey. “Tri-Lakes’ dedication to continuous improvement serves as a model for all.”

According to Wes Sigler, Tri-Lakes Medical Center CEO, the award represents important recognition from the industry of TLMC’s efforts.

“As an organization that adopted a total quality management philosophy, it is gratifying to achieve the level of improvement in clinical processes that merits this kind of recognition,” said Sigler.

Press Ganey cited  achievements such as physician recruitment, employee and physician training mechanisms, hospital renovations and technological advances that allowed TLMC to increase patient satisfaction and looks forward to continued improvement in 2012.