Looming hospital closings are shaking up Atlanta’s healthcare landscape.

Like many neighborhoods across the country, Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward is changing.

Condo buildings and modern low-rise housing characterize city blocks of low-income housing. Many longtime residents of the historic neighborhood where Martin Luther King Jr. was born have been priced out and moved to other parts of the city.

Atlanta Medical Center, a 460-bed Level 1 trauma center, will be the next game-changer.

Despite banners touting the hospital’s commitment to the area — “120 Years Caring For Atlanta,” one read — its nonprofit owner, WellStar Health System, recently announced plans to close the hospital’s doors on Nov. 1.

Georgia has seen a number of rural hospital closings over the past decade, but this year Atlanta has joined other urban centers in closing facilities.

WellStar’s announcement has fueled the political debate over Medicaid expansion ahead of the Nov. 8 midterm elections. Like 11 other states, Georgia has not expanded eligibility rules for its Medicaid program under the Affordable Care Act, and hospital officials across the state say the inaction has hurt their bottom lines as they still treat large numbers of uninsured patients, many of whom cannot pay. Treatment.

Wellstar’s announcement shocked other members of the community, including the town’s mayor, Andre Dickens.

On a recent weekday morning, Theresa Smith, 60, who lives in the area, said she often gets care there for chronic digestive problems. “This hospital will be missed by the entire community,” she said.

Liliana BakhtiariAn Atlanta City Council member whose district includes the hospital was scathing in her assessment. “There will be loss of life and serious injuries that will not be taken care of, and I wish that was more important to Wellstar,” she said.

Wellstar declined KHN’s request for an interview about the closing.

Nancy KaneTH Chan, an assistant professor at Harvard’s School of Public Health, looks at the connection between Atlanta’s situation and hospital closures in other major cities.

Many were purchased by large health care companies as part of package deals and served mostly low-income minority populations.

“If you get a hospital, you have an obligation to fix it,” Kane said. “Wellstar has the money to invest in this hospital. It’s a choice,” he said.

Some community members wonder if the hospital’s closure will lead to expensive real estate development on the 20 acres Wellstar owns in the neighborhood.

Randy Pimsler“It could be a blank slate for redevelopment or new development,” said an architect whose firm has designed projects in the area.

Politicians were quick to turn the shutdown into a campaign issue. And at the center of the debate is Gov. Brian Kemp’s health care policy.

Andrew Isenhor, a spokesman for Kemp, said the Kemp group is working on a long-term plan to strengthen health care in the area after the closure. Kemp, a Republican who is running for a second term in November, He will try to keep the institution open.

But officials at the nonprofit Grady Health System said this week they met with Kemp’s office, Dickens and Fulton and DeKalb county officials to discuss a source of funding to support capital needs at Grady Memorial Hospital, a Level 1 emergency center about a mile from Atlanta Medical Center.

Grady Atlanta Medical Center is expecting up to 2,500 more emergency room visits a month after closing its doors.

“We can handle all the trauma,” said Grady Health System CEO John Haupert. Still, the added ER crunch will be a challenge as more patients arrive, said Ryan Locke, chief health policy officer at Grady.

The state funding will accelerate Grady’s existing plans to convert offices into inpatient care facilities, which will add more than 180 beds for adults a year from now. The hospital is adding 40 to 45 beds over the next six weeks, and plans to install a 24-bed field hospital to help handle the influx of patients from the closed hospital.

The shutdown will put Medicaid expansion “front and center” in the political conversation, Haupert said. Kemp proposed a limited plan that would provide access to a state-federal insurance program for people who can meet a work requirement or similar obligation.

His challenger, Democrat Stacey Abrams, has made expanding Medicaid a major campaign issue.

“It’s not surprising anymore,” Abrams said. This is expected to happen as the Kemp administration refuses to act.

U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church, located less than a mile from the hospital, opposed the closure, citing strain on health care facilities since Georgia refused to expand Medicaid. WellStar officials said Medicaid expansion alone would not have kept the Atlanta facility open.

Earlier this year, WellStar stopped providing emergency room and inpatient services at the hospital in East Point, southwest of Atlanta. At the time, he said, those patients could be seen at the Atlanta Medical Center, about 8 miles away. Haupert estimated it would cost hundreds of millions of dollars to modernize the soon-to-be-shuttered Atlanta hospital, making it difficult to save.

The shutdown, just months apart, could help Abrams’ argument for Medicaid expansion resonate with voters, he said. Second GillespieAssociate Professor of Political Science at Emory University. “An issue that was maybe geared more towards rural Georgia is now suddenly an Atlanta area issue,” she said.

Gillespie warned that other issues, such as inflation, crime and abortion, could be more motivating for Georgia voters.

In suburban Marietta, WellStar acquired AMC and East Point Hospital from Tenet Healthcare. During the purchase in 2016Part of a $575 million deal that includes three other hospitals in the metro area.

Todd Green, a former Wellstar community board member, said the system has put more resources into the suburbs.

“WellStar’s suburban hospital-oriented management approach has unfortunately left many of Atlanta’s black and brown communities without access to close and critical health care services,” he said in a written statement.

In Wellstar Notice of closureIn the year He said the facility has invested more than $350 million in capital improvements since 2016 and has “lost $107 million in the last 12 months, due to declining revenue and rising inflation for staff and supplies.”

The decision to close the hospital did not come as a surprise to some staff, said Dr. Suleiman Wazirud-DinAn emergency medicine physician at the hospital said doctors “know they’re going to lose money.”

But the sudden announcement has sent shockwaves through doctors, nurses and other non-medical staff, he said.

In the days since the closing announcement, Grady has offered jobs to various Atlanta medical center employees, from doctors and nurses to housekeeping and security staff.

David Patton has lived in Atlanta’s Old Fourth Ward for 30 years and says the Atlanta Medical Center is a big part of his life.

His grandfather passed away in a nursing home on campus, he was cared for by Erm, his son took swimming lessons at the hospital’s athletic club, and he saw the neighborhood transform from a “forgotten” part of the city. It became a lightning rod for new development.

“It boggles my mind that a facility like this would be shut down overnight,” he said.

KN (Kaiser Health News) is a national news division that produces in-depth journalism on health issues. Along with policy analysis and polling, KHN is one of the three major work programs on the KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is a non-profit organization that provides information to the nation on health issues.

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