NEW YORK — NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia, a nationally known organ donation center, plans to close its Acute Inpatient Rehab Unit and use the beds in the emergency room.
The hospital is seeking state approval to convert the 16 rehabilitation beds at Milstein Hospital into inpatient beds. The goal, the hospital says, is to reduce wait times and crowds in the emergency department and improve overall care when patients are transferred from the emergency department to other departments.
Hospital officials say there is an urgent need for emergency room beds.
“There is increasing demand from various clinical services,” an official said.
NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia said in a statement, in part: “Our patients will continue to have access to evaluations and rehabilitation services as they transition from the hospital to home or a specialty rehabilitation facility.”
The hospital also says it is continually assessing the best way to meet the needs of its patients. As for employees, they are offered similar roles.
Community members and hospital workers voice opposition to plan
The community recently made itself heard at a meeting of Manhattan Community Board 12.
“I’m not convinced it’s going to change the story. What it is going to do is, well, we told you so,” one person said.
Some are concerned that continuity of care for people staying in a rehabilitation center is being compromised.
“Providing patients with the quality of life they need so they can go home, get back to their families, their jobs, their communities is something that doesn’t happen anywhere else in the hospital the way it does in rehabilitation centers,” said Kaile Eison, a physical therapy rehabilitation physician.
“When I was there, it started out as 40 beds, but it was later reduced to 16 beds,” said Rita Hamburgh, former site director of NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia.
Some fear that it will be a challenge to send patients to another hospital.
“Families who depend on training don’t have cars. What are they going to do?” Hamburgh said.
“They say they can go downtown to Brooklyn or Cornell. A lot of people here in the Heights, you know, your family comes, and they come at different times to bring you food, to take care of you,” said heart transplant patient Tollyae Dickerson.
Alecia Reid
