TODAY: NYSNA Members from North Country Hospitals Hold Town Hall on Access to Care Crisis

**MEDIA ADVISORY FOR TODAY, DEC. 10 AT 6 P.M.** 

Contact: Andrea Penman-Lomeli | press@nysna.org | 347-559-3169  
Kristi Barnes | press@nysna.org | 646-853-4489 

NYSNA MEMBERS FROM NORTH COUNTRY HOSPITALS HOLD TOWN HALL ON ACCESS TO CARE CRISIS  

NYSNA Nurses and Healthcare Professionals Discuss How Healthcare Cuts Negatively Impact Patient Care and What Hospitals Can Do to Protect Patients

N.Y. - On Wed. Dec. 10, New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) nurses and healthcare professionals from North Country hospitals, including Adirondack Medical Center, Carthage Area Medical Center, Claxton-Hepburn Medical Center, Samaritan Medical Center, UVM-Alice Hyde Medical Center, UVM-Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital, and UVM-Elizabethtown Community Hospital will gather to discuss what hospitals can do to protect access to healthcare and preserve essential services in a virtual Zoom town hall. NYSNA members are all bargaining for fair contracts that protect safe patient care. NYSNA members and allies will discuss the negative trends in healthcare that affect frontline staff, patients, and North Country communities, and how elected officials, allies, and hospitals can preserve access to quality care.

WHAT: North Country Access to Care Virtual Town Hall

WHO: NYSNA healthcare professionals and allies, including Assembly Member Michael Cashman, 1199SEIU and Citizen Action.

WHEN: Dec. 10 at 6:00 p.m.

WHERE: Zoom, RVSP Here:  https://nysna.tfaforms.net/5110937

Nurses and healthcare professionals across the North Country are united to protect safe patient care in the face of impending Medicaid cuts. Over the past several years, frontline staff have watched as North Country hospitals consolidate around regional hospital systems and cut essential healthcare services. NYSNA will preview new research from a forthcoming whitepaper that outlines how cuts to pediatric, maternal and trauma services at North Country hospitals in the last decade have negatively impacted patient care. At a critical moment in healthcare across the country, North Country nurses and healthcare professionals are united around demanding hospitals do their part to protect access to care for residents across the region.  

Amid increasingly compromised rural access to care, a national maternal health crisis, and extreme Medicaid cuts that have the potential to decimate funding to rural hospitals, NYSNA members at North Country hospitals are fighting for the quality healthcare patients deserve. Over the last several decades, hospital systems like the University of Vermont (UVM) Health Network have acquired North Country hospitals. Even though UVM has promised efficiency and expanded access as it acquires small regional hospitals, its expansion into New York state and consolidation has led to the shuttering of essential services and units, particularly in maternal, pediatric, and emergency care.

Additionally, as a number of North Country hospitals have acquired Critical Access status, a status that affords hospitals higher Medicare reimbursements but requires a capacity of 25 inpatient beds or fewer, they have reduced essential services, increasing the distance patients must travel to receive care or eliminated services altogether. While Critical Access status is intended to help North Country patients, irregular oversight has led to the loss of 226 beds across the region. The loss of these services threatens patient care.  

NYSNA members want all North Country hospitals to provide safe patient care and support the local economy with good jobs. As they fight for fair contracts, NYSNA members are united in their commitment to safe patient care and holding hospitals accountable. They are demanding safe staffing, a safe workplace, and a secure future for nurses and the care they provide. As patient advocates, healthcare workers will continue to fight for the resources and staff patients deserve because access to safe patient care in the North Country is at stake.

Bill Schneider, RN, at Adirondack Medical Center, said, “As rural hospitals, the mechanisms that hospitals and insurance companies use to shirk the burden of care are different than those in urban centers, but the results are essentially the same: services are being cut, patients are struggling to receive care, and people are getting sicker and sicker. We’re here today to demand that our hospitals do better, and that the state hold our hospitals accountable because your zip code should not determine the quality care you receive.”

Vicki Davis-Courson, RN, at UVM-Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital, said, “I grew up in Massena, N.Y., where you can no longer have a child because of service cuts. For many mothers, what might otherwise appear as inconvenient distances to access maternal healthcare has life or death consequences for them and their newborns. We can’t continue to let hospitals consolidate services that every local community needs. That’s why we’re speaking up and demanding hospitals protect access to care for North Country residents.”  

NYSNA President Nancy Hagans, RN, BSN, CCRN, said, “North Country patients deserve the absolute best care possible, and that’s why NYSNA members are united today. It’s always frontline staff who are at the bedside and witness the impacts of hospitals’ decision-making that intervene and advocate for patients. If we aren’t speaking up, who else will defend safe patient care? I’m proud of the members who are gathering and sharing what hospitals must do to ensure patients get the care they need.”  

Assembly Member Michael S. Cashman said, “Access to care is one of the defining challenges for rural communities. When people have to travel long distances or navigate limited local options, it puts their health and their futures at risk. I’m proud to stand with NYSNA as we work to protect, expand access, strengthen local services, and ensure every patient in the North Country can receive the care they need when they need it. Together, we must strengthen rural healthcare so every North Country resident can get the right care, at the right time, close to home.

Todd Hobler, Executive Vice-President, Upstate Division, 1199SEIU, said, “The Federal Budget passed by Congress and signed into law by President Trump in July contains enormous cuts to Medicaid. Medicaid is the single most important source of healthcare funding in the US, and this budget makes the largest cuts to the program ever. There is not a single hospital, nursing home, homecare agency, or community clinic in the country which will be immune to these awful cuts. Ultimately, these circumstances mean that we, as 1199 members, are in the fight of our lives to protect our livelihoods and our patients. All of this is to underscore the urgency of this moment and how our unity and collective efforts in response to these attacks are more vital than ever."  

Ursula Rozum, Citizen Action, said, “Behind every federal budget cut is a real person who risks losing lifesaving care. The Republican budget plan that Elise Stefanik voted for guts Medicaid, ends ACA subsidies, and threatens coverage for millions—including small-business owners, working families, and people managing chronic illness right here in New York. And the decisions made by Elise Stefanik and GOP leaders in Washington will have devastating consequences for our hospitals, our homes, and our communities at a time when people are already struggling with the rising costs of healthcare and basic needs.”

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The New York State Nurses Association represents more than 42,000 members in New York State. We are New York’s largest union and professional association for registered nurses. NYSNA is an affiliate of National Nurses United, AFL-CIO, the country's largest and fastest-growing union and professional association of registered nurses, with more than 225,000 members nationwide.