Partnerships prove crucial to helping local hospitals stay afloat

Several years ago, officials at Thompson Health surveyed their medical staff and area doctors about services they wanted to see the agency provide — or provide more of.

One area they pointed to was pulmonary medicine (treatment of the lungs). Michael Stapleton Jr., president and CEO of Thompson Health, said that evolved into the agency — which includes F.F. Thompson Hospital — aiming to treat more critical care patients and needing a larger intensive care unit.

“The vast majority of those surveyed were private physicians. We asked them what services were you consistently having to send your patients to Rochester for,” Stapleton said. “What we found is we had to transfer our sickest patients. We had to transfer well over 300 patients a year to Rochester because we just didn’t have space for them (in our ICU). We also needed more outpatient services for people with COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), lung cancer, and emphysema.”