Mississippi Today
UMMC downsizes specialized teams that transport sick kids, babies from hospitals around state
The University of Mississippi Medical Center in April laid off seven specially trained medical providers who transport children and babies in need of critical care from hospitals around the state to Jackson.
The cuts brought the total number of staff on the pediatric and neonatal transport teams from 21 to 14.
UMMC officials said the reduction was the result of a routine evaluation looking for operational efficiencies.
The transport teams offer timely, hospital-level care in a specialized ambulance for critically sick or injured children and babies. The teams are made up of specially certified paramedics, nurses and nurse practitioners, and the ambulances house more equipment and medicines than regular ambulances โ โmore than โฆ most rural hospitals have,โ according to a January 2023 UMMC press release highlighting a pediatric transport team member.
The teams can also provide care in a hospital’s emergency room before transporting the patient to Jackson.
Prior to the layoffs, the Mississippi Center for Emergency Services, which oversees the transport teams, housed one pediatric critical care ambulance and one neonatal critical care ambulance. Two of each provider plus a driver would go on each ambulance to respond to each call.
A former employee says both teams were โalready strappedโ to respond to the calls that came in before the teams were reduced and combined into one.
Further reducing their ability to respond to these calls, the employee said, โis a real disservice to the children of Mississippi.โ The person spoke to Mississippi Today on the condition of anonymity out of career concerns.
UMMC did not answer questions from Mississippi Today specifically about how the decision to cut the teams was made or address what kind of impact it will have on children in need of this care in remote areas of the state.
โMedical Center units routinely evaluate their operational models to identify efficiencies. A thorough review of our transport programs revealed that we could redesign models for some teams and continue to fulfill responsibilities,โ said Patrice Guilfoyle, a spokesperson for UMMC, in an emailed statement. โAppropriate allocation of resources allows for investment in more areas that address the needs of Mississippians.โ
After the layoffs, however, there is one truck for both teams, and one pediatric and one neonatal provider total to respond to calls.
Neighboring Arkansas โ which also has one children’s hospital in the state โ has a similarly modeled transport team. It is cross trained for both pediatric and neonatal transports, according to a spokesperson with Arkansas Children’s.
โAll Angel One transports are staffed by a nurse and respiratory therapist with support from medical control, an intensive care specialist from our Neonatal Intensive Care Unit or Pediatric Intensive Care Unit who can provide specialized guidance,โ spokesperson Hilary DeMillo said.
UMMC’s chief financial officer said in May that the medical center is experiencing โvery strong revenuesโ for both May and the year to date. In April, she also reported revenues of $177 million, or $16 million over budget.
โI do expect this year to be even better than this,โ she said of future financial projections.
Transport volume numbers for the months of May and June โ the two months following the layoffs โ were at their lowest in a 12-month period for the pediatric transport team, according to records obtained by Mississippi Today through a public records request. The numbers for the neonatal team in May and June did not see a noticeable decrease.
Marc Rolph, executive director of communications and marketing for UMMC, said there was a two-week staff training period in May that โtemporarily limited our operational capabilities.โย
Rolph did not answer why the numbers were lower in June or how they compared to the same months’ numbers in previous years.
Mississippi Today also requested the number of missed calls โ or requests for transports that came in and were not fulfilled โ for a 12-month period beginning in June 2023. UMMC responded to the request that there were no such records.
Most Mississippi hospitals contacted by Mississippi Today declined to weigh in on the impact of the changes.
UMMC has the state’s only children’s hospital and the highest level neonatal intensive care unit and trauma center.
The hospital’s transport teams are voluntarily accredited by the Commission on the Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems and have been since July of 2015, according to Jan Eichel, the associate executive director of the organization.
The accreditation standards require two critical care providers per vehicle.
โIt’s not uncommon to have a cross-trained teamโ like the new combined pediatric and neonatal transport teams at UMMC, she said. โThey should be very proud that they are adhering to the highest standards in patient care and safety.โ
Editor’s note: Kate Royals, Mississippi Today’s community health editor since January 2022, worked as a writer/editor for UMMC’s Office of Communications from November 2018 through August 2020, writing press releases and features about the medical center’s schools of dentistry and nursing.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
AT&T, union reach deal ending strike
AT&T workers are back on the job today after the company reached a tentative agreement with the Communications Workers of America to end a month-long strike in the Southeast.
The new deal includes a 19.33% pay increase for all workers, and more affordable healthcare premiums.
Wire technicians and utility operations employes get an extra 3% pay increase.
In a statement, CWA president Claude Cummings Jr. praised the solidarity of the striking workers.
โI believe in the power of unity, and the unity our members and retirees have shown during these contract negotiations has been outstanding and gave our bargaining teams the backing they needed to deliver strong contracts,โ he said.
CWA district president Jermaine Travis told Mississippi Today that he and his coworkers are happy to be back at work.ย
โIt’s been a long month, so everybody is excited to get back to work and get back to taking care of business,โ he said.
Travis also noted the significance of the strike, the longest telecommunications strike in the Southeast.
โI think we’re gonna look back at this strike, at this moment in history, and see it was really important for workers to stand up for the rights and force companies to do right by them, so I think we did a good thing,โ he said.
AT&T has also reached a tentative agreement with the CWA in the West.
“As we’ve said since day 1, our goal has been to reach fair agreements that recognize the hard work our employees do to serve our customers with competitive market-based pay and benefits that are among the best in the nation — and that’s exactly what was accomplished,โ AT&T said in a released statement. โThese agreements also support our competitive position in the broadband industry where we can grow and win against our mostly non-union competitors.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1925
Sept. 16, 1925
โThe King of the Bluesโ was born Riley B. King on a plantation near Itta Bena, Mississippi, the son of sharecroppers.
While singing in the church choir, he watched the pastor playing a Sears Roebuck guitar and told the preacher he wanted to learn how to play. By age 12, he had his own guitar and began listening to the blues on the radio. After playing in churches, he went to Memphis to pursue a music career in 1948, playing on the radio and working as a deejay who was known as โBlues Boyโ and eventually โB.B.โ
Within a year, B.B. King was recording songs, many of them produced by Sam Phillips, who later founded Sun Records. In 1952, โ3 O’Clock Bluesโ became a hit, and dozens followed.
While others sought to bring change through the courts, King did it through music. The songs that he and other blues artists created drew many listeners across racial lines. One of the biggest fans walked into the studio one day and called him โsir.โ His name? Elvis Presley, whose first big hit was the blues song, โThat’s All Right, Mama.โ
King explained that music was like water โ something โfor every living person and every living thing.โ His smash hit, โThe Thrill Is Gone,โ made him an international star and led to collaborations with some of the world’s greatest artists.
He survived a fire that almost burned up his beloved guitar, โLucille,โ and won 18 Grammys as well as a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1987, he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Both Time and Rolling Stone magazines ranked him as one of the greatest guitarists of all time.
In 2006, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the greatest civilian honor. Two years later, his hometown of Indianola honored him by opening the B.B. King Museum and Delta Interpretive Center. After he died in 2015, thousands flocked to the Mississippi Delta for the wake and funeral.
โHands that once picked cotton,โ the preacher told the crowd, โwould someday pick guitar strings on a national and international stage.โ He performed till the end, telling Rolling Stone in 2013 that he had only missed 18 days of performing in 65 years. He died two years later at 89 after battling diabetes for decades.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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The post Podcast: Sen. David Blount discusses tax cuts, retirement system, mobile sports betting appeared first on Mississippi Today.
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