A Bishop In The Exam Room: When Faith Dictates Health Care Instead Of Science

[niyad]

(lengthy, excellent article on catholic hospitals and health care, especially for women)

A Bishop In The Exam Room: When Faith Dictates Health Care Instead Of Science


When Rita, a Michigan-based OB-GYN, learned that the hospital where she worked would be switching hands, she was dismayed. The secular community hospital, Crittenton, had plans to join with Ascension Health, a prominent Catholic nonprofit hospital chain. Rita, who asked that her real name be withheld to protect her identity, knew the transition would profoundly impact her ability to do her job the way she saw fit. The OB-GYN specifically wanted to work at a place where she could practice the full scope of reproductive care, from preventing pregnancy to delivering babies. But now, with the hospital merger looming in the not-so-distant future, that possibility seemed increasingly unlikely. Rita also understood the change in leadership meant that her patients’ medical options would be limited. That’s because Catholic hospitals follow a set of rules written by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which often prohibit doctors from performing basic reproductive services — like contraception, sterilization, in vitro fertilization, abortion — and end-of-life care.

. . . . .
As hospitals throughout the country struggle with financial woes, many have begun to merge with Catholic systems in order to stay in business. This means a growing number of patients are winding up in institutions guided by religious doctrine. Between 2001 and 2016, the number of hospitals affiliated with the Catholic Church increased by 22 percent. Today, one in six patients in the U.S. is cared for at a Catholic hospital — a troubling trend for health care providers like Rita, who worry that patients are increasingly being placed in centers that provide services based on faith rather than medical necessity. “I do think as more places are being purchased by Catholic systems it’s going to become more of a problem,” she told ThinkProgress. “To take away the ability to provide services that people need or desire… I think it’s very upsetting both for an OB-GYN and also for a woman. Having those choices gives you the ability to participate in society.”
. . . . .




But while Lois Uttley, MergerWatch’s director, believes Catholic hospitals do deliver “excellent care” in many treatment areas, she and her group are working to shine a light on a major exception. They believe Catholic hospitals prevent many women from getting the reproductive health care they need — even procedures that are medically necessary — ultimately putting them in an untenable situation once they walk through the doors of one of these religious facilities.

Once a hospital elects to merge with the Catholic system, it agrees to obey a set of directives issued by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Called the “Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services” (ERDs), these rules include instructions that Catholic care “should distinguish itself by service to and advocacy for those people whose social condition puts them at the margins of our society and makes them particularly vulnerable to discrimination: the poor; the uninsured and the underinsured; children and the unborn; single parents; the elderly; those with incurable diseases and chemical dependencies; racial minorities; immigrants and refugees.”

. . . .

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2016/06/22/3781708/catholic-hospitals-mergers-womens-health/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=tptop3&utm_term=0&utm_content=0&elqTrackId=183ca4dcc6594ffc865efad8b4e7ae4c&elq=801915b8346b4474a1b64d355b0bcb7e&elqaid=30560&elqat=1&elqCampaignId=5874

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

[niyad]

2. thank you. it has been astonishing me for years that people fail to understand why

this issue is so very important.

[smirkymonkey]

3. K&R

[Jerry442]

4. Psalm 90:10 (KJV) says...

The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

Clearly, Christian-based hospitals are not supposed to treat anyone over 70.

This makes exactly as much sense as the RCC's current policy on reproductive health care.

[niyad]

5. this situation just keeps getting worse and worse.

[Crunchy Frog]

12. I'm strongly convinced that our local Catholic hospital

tried to actively euthanize my mother's friend who had Alzheimer's disease. They're also on record as having attempted to butcher a young woman for her organs, claiming she was brain dead, when she was actually fully neurologically intact.

Some of these places are extremely seedy, and their "pro-life" stance is exclusively about denying appropriate reproductive care to women.

[Dawson Leery]

13. The RCC cannot be trusted.

[Wounded Bear]

6. Long, but a must read...

for anybody concerned about a religious takeover of medical facilities nation-wide.

As a Washington resident, it's nice to see that they "won" the issue, but the cost is perhaps too high.

[alarimer]

7. There have been threads here where people don't seem to think this is a problem.

And it wouldn't be a problem if people had other options but in many there are no other options. In any case, in an emergency, you can't really expect people to have to choose which hospital.

[niyad]

8. exactly. in many cases, the catholic hospital is all there is within a hundred or 150 miles. not

an option in many cases.

[niyad]

9. . . .

[Solly Mack]

10. Kick

[lindysalsagal]

11. I'm trying to introduce legislation that forces disclosure of religious meddling in healthcare.

This can't go on. The ACLU is suing in several states like michigan and illinois where women have been sent home in the middle of miscarriages.

Pro-life, my ass.

[Initech]

15. Yup pro lifers are the biggest hypocrites on the planet.

My favorite thing is that so many pro lifers are also huge supporters of the NRA. You can't be pro life and pro NRA. I would think that those two things would cancel each other out, right?

[countryjake]

14. Niyad, I was just writing about that over in the Washington group...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10825550

in a thread I'd made earlier about the ruling that a judge handed down in my county, concerning our largest hospital, Skagit Valley, which has never been in compliance with my state's voter-approved Reproductive Privacy Act (RPA) of 1991. The ACLU of WA brought a case against them last year and the judge's decision this week was in favor of women's right to proper health care! PeaceHealth, the Catholic conglomerate that unsuccessfully attempted a takeover of that facility and Skagit Regional Health, did actually manage to get our only other hospital, now called PeaceHealth United General Medical Center.

Way too many in this nation are unaware of the church's tactic of stepping in to plop religion into struggling hospitals, til it's already a done deal coming to the only hospital within fifty miles of your home!

[niyad]

17. thank you for this very important information

in some cases, it is the only hospital within a hundred miles. scary.

[1939]

16. Crittenton Hospital

was built largely by donations from the community. My late parents were big financial supporters as it gave them a hospital close by their home.

As far as Catholic hospitals are concerned, I use Holy Cross here in south Florida. Being 77 years old and male, reproductive rights aren't high on my criteria for choosing a hospital. Why I and my 71 year old wife chose Holy Cross is that it is cleaner, better organized, and a whole lot friendlier than our county-run hospital, North Broward Hospital.

My wife and I have used the Holy Cross emergency room once each and we were seen and treated promptly. When my sister-in-law went to the North Broward emergency room, it was a two hour wait to be seen. Ten per cent of my property taxes go to prop up North Broward. The board of the North Broward Hospital Authority is under investigation for financial malfeasance and illegal kickbacks.

[niyad]

18. Do I understand, then, that since you have no need for reproductive services, you have

no problem with those who do need them being denied on the basis of religious dogma?

[1939]

19. Closing down all of the Catholic hospitals

Will improve overall access to health care how?

[niyad]

20. and denying women health care is helpful how?

[trotsky]

21. Closing them down isn't the goal.

Making sure they provide the services women want is. No one is losing anything, but women gain.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

23. That isn't what will happen in most cases

The Catholic Church will close down the hospitals and leave.

They can't be forced to stay open.

[trotsky]

24. So you're admitting the wonderful Catholic church will choose dogma over serving people?

If so, we'll figure out a way to make it work. I'm not worried. Women's medical treatment options shouldn't be something we allow ourselves to be blackmailed over.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

25. So you're admitting

that you demand that the Catholic Church adhere to it's faith, but only the parts you agree with?

The reason that many of these hospitals are run by the Catholic Church is because no one else wanted to do it. Someone should have already "figured out a way to make it work", and then the Church wouldn't have taken over the hospitals in the first place.

[trotsky]

28. Catholics themselves can opt out of any medical treatment they want.

They should not be able to force everyone else to abide by their dogma.

[Major Nikon]

26. They will stay open for the same reason they remain open now

Money.

If they weren't profitable, they RCC would have already shut them down. Closing them down would be a monumentally stupid financial move for the RCC. If it comes down to getting out of the business, they will simply sell them.

[SickOfTheOnePct]

27. If the areas where they are

were overrun with buyers, they wouldn't have been bought by the Catholic Church in the first place.

And I've never heard of a Catholic hospital that was for-profit, so I'm not sure where you're getting that from.

[countryjake]

22. Ethical & Religious Directives strictly enforced by the church include elder care...

so, have you ever checked your Holy Cross Hospital's web site to see what sort of End of Life care they are willing to provide? Are there any assurances that DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) forms will be made available, or that dying with dignity and Hospice services will be provided?

The fight to stop the Catholic church's takeover of tax-payer funded public health facilities has never been only about women's rights to proper health care services. Granted, that is a main concern, but this struggle also focuses on the right to decent (and, often, necessary) End of Life care for our senior citizens and also, the right to protection from discrimination for our LGBT community in this nation.

It's understandable that those who live in close proximity to their personal choice of any medical facility might not be very concerned by these restrictive religious "affiliations" but further investigation of the practices of that favorite might be something wise to do.

I'm older, too, and a couple of years ago a Catholic corporation succeeded in taking over the only hospital that serves my county's vast upriver area (2,000-square-miles) and the similarly wild mountainous region of the adjoining county just to the south. I've lived in those upriver mountains for more than two decades and I can only view the Catholic prohibitions that now are policy at the only hospital available to me and mine as a theft of my rights as a senior.