Mississippi Hospitals Facing Shortage of Trauma Surgeons

The Mississippi Trauma Advisory Committee, which administers the state Trauma Care System, a network of hospitals that "work together to get trauma care patients to the most appropriate facility in the least amount of time," has suspended inspections of member hospitals for one year to allow officials at the facilities to "address the growing problem of surgeons leaving the system," the AP/Memphis Commercial Appeal reports. Surgeons have the left the system as a result of reductions in Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements, a lack of malpractice insurance and several multimillion-dollar malpractice verdicts, Dr. Hugh Gamble, who heads the committee, said. The system has established two levels of care -- level one trauma centers, which have specialists present at all times, and level two trauma centers, which can have specialists available "within a matter of minutes." However, as a result of the shortage of surgeons, many hospitals in the system cannot comply with the requirements for their designations, the AP/Commercial Appeal reports. For example, officials at Greenwood Leflore Medical Center, a level two trauma center, found that the hospital "no longer complied" with the requirements for the designation after one of the facility's three general surgeons temporarily halted his practice to prepare for a lawsuit. In addition, a neurosurgeon has announced plans to resign from the hospital, and the number of obstetricians at the facility has dropped from four to two as a result of an inability to cover the cost of their malpractice insurance. "We're in a crisis," Mississippi Health Officer Ed Thompson said (AP/Memphis Commercial Appeal, 3/19).