A Pennsylvania decide has briefly blocked plans by Crozer Well being to shut its Delaware County Memorial Hospital in Drexel Hill and convert it right into a behavioral healthcare facility.
Courtroom of Widespread Pleas Decide Robert Shenkin dominated Tuesday that each one current operations at Delaware County Memorial ought to proceed and that the events ought to meet to debate adjustments to the hospital.
Shenkin’s preliminary injunction adopted a criticism filed Sept. 28 by community-focused nonprofit Basis for Delaware County and others, arguing the closure violated a 2016 settlement that required Prospect Medical Holdings to keep up acute care at 4 native hospitals, together with Delaware County Memorial, for 10 years. For-profit Prospect acquired the former Crozer-Keystone Well being System in 2016 and finally rebranded it as Crozer Well being.
Springfield, Pennsylvania-based Crozer introduced in September it will shut Delaware County Memorial’s emergency division and finish different providers on the 168-bed facility inside 60 days. It plans to remodel the placement right into a greater than 100-bed hospital devoted to behavioral well being, that includes a disaster care unit and a give attention to inpatient psychiatric care, detox/rehabilitation and senior behavioral well being. The plan known as for the revamped facility to open by the spring of 2023. Crozer stated on the time the change would “help within the behavioral well being disaster within the county and the area.”
The closure would lead to layoffs of greater than 330 staff, in response to court docket paperwork.
Crozer additionally introduced plans to transition its Springfield campus to outpatient providers by the tip of the 12 months. Taylor Hospital in Ridley Park and Crozer-Chester Medical Middle in Upland will proceed their common providers.
“What we’ve completed is assess what [the] wants are in partnership with physicians, the neighborhood and native leaders,” Crozer CEO Anthony Esposito stated in a September information launch. “By way of this engagement, we decided that entry to community-based, high-quality, protected and efficient providers are key to being conscious of the neighborhood whereas additionally addressing the altering nature of healthcare right this moment.”
Three well being programs function hospitals that serve Delaware County sufferers: Crozer, Predominant Line Well being and Trinity Well being.
A spokesperson for Crozer stated the group is conscious of Shenkin’s ruling and conferring with its counsel.
Frances Sheehan, president of the Basis for Delaware County, stated the group is happy with the decide’s choice and glad he acknowledged that “closing the hospital could be tremendously damaging to the neighborhood.” The muse, previously the Crozer-Keystone Group Basis, was shaped in 2016 with proceeds from the sale to Prospect.