Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

HEALTH CARE: Coalition protests proposed increases

Legislator faults out-of-state companies

Demonstrators protesting increased hospital care rates crowd a pedestrian overpass and sidewalk Monday afternoon in front of Sunrise Hospital. Photo by Ralph Fountain.

Police, firefighters, teachers, hotel employees and construction workers -- all members of the Health Services Coalition -- rallied Monday outside Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center to protest what they call excessive hospital care rate increases proposed by the corporate owners of hospitals in Las Vegas.

The late-afternoon protest in Las Vegas, which drew about 500 people, followed a speech in Carson City in which Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, D-Henderson, told the Legislature that out-of-state health corporations are "harvesting the pocketbooks" of hardworking Nevadans to "ship millions of dollars back East."

Perkins said the Legislature should look into a "community reinvestment act" for health care. He said such an act would require hospitals to invest part of their profits in local programs before paying corporate headquarters.

Every two to three years, Perkins said, a crisis occurs in Las Vegas as the Health Services Coalition, which negotiates hospital insurance rates on behalf of 300,000 people in the Las Vegas Valley, tries to come up with reasonable rates for its members.

"We need to find the root cause now, before the next crisis is upon us," Perkins said.

The protesters outside Sunrise Hospital said Nashville-based HCA corporation, which owns Sunrise, MountainView and Southern Hills hospitals, is asking for nearly a 30 percent increase over the next three years.

"That's more than the seven to eight percent yearly increase that HCA said it is negotiating around the country," said Andrew Brignone, an attorney for the coalition.

Mary Ella Holloway, president of the Clark County Education Association, said teachers will be getting a 2 percent increase in wages next year.

"It will be more difficult than ever for Clark County to recruit teachers if our health care costs keep skyrocketing," Holloway said at the protest.

"Who do you know that gets these kinds of increases in their paycheck every year?" asked Rusty McAllister, a fire captain. "At some point, this just has to stop."

Jeff Prescott, a spokesman for HCA in Nashville, said in a phone interview that the 7 percent to 8 percent yearly increase in managed care that Brignone refers to is an average.

"Some places are higher, some are lower, " he said, adding that labor costs are often a large factor.

Because Las Vegas is booming and new hospitals and health care institutions need staff, labor costs are often high.

Brignone said HCA, through the increases, is trying to recoup costs of adding a trauma center at Sunrise.

But Amy Stevens, a spokeswoman for Sunrise, said no such link exists.

"We started working on the trauma center three years ago," she said.

Brignone said negotiations with Catholic Healthcare West, owner of the St. Rose Dominican Hospitals, and Universal Health Services, which runs Valley, Desert Springs, Summerlin and Spring Valley hospitals, "are proceeding positively."

Contracts with all three hospital corporations are scheduled to run out this week.