Children’s Hospital at Erlanger Vice President and CEO Don Mueller presents during an Erlanger Health System Board of Trustees meeting in the POB room at Erlanger on Thursday, June 27, 2019 in Chattanooga, Tenn.It’s been a year since Erlanger Health System announced the Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt would take over management of the main campus and Erlanger East Hospital neonatal intensive care units, often called NICUs.
The transition was rocky at times, but at an Erlanger board of trustees meeting Thursday, officials said the units are running smoothly now.
“We try to always do what’s best for patients, and we made some tough decisions last year regarding the neonatology unit,” Don Mueller, CEO of Children’s Hospital at Erlanger, said Thursday. “A huge amount of recruiting has taken place in a very short period of time. We believe this is an excellent group to continue moving forward in the NICU.”
Backlash over the change rattled the NICU in the months leading up to the switch, which officially took place in December. Non-compete clauses in the previous providers’ contracts prevented the physicians and nurse practitioners, many of whom had longstanding careers and established families in Chattanooga, from continuing to practice in the area.
Then, an influx of babies combined with not enough nurses led to overcrowding and longer length of stay. At the meeting, trustee Henry Hoss recalled touring the unit around that time.
“It seemed like there were 78, 79, 80 babies in there, and we’re only licensed for about 65, 66,” Hoss said, asking if the problem was resolved.
Mueller said babies are seasonal, and although Erlanger considered diverting those patients to other facilities, the other NICUs throughout the region were also full.
“We have to handle those problems. We’ve gotten through that and hoping we’re not going to hit those kind of numbers any time soon, but we’re much better staffed to handle that now,” he said.
Now, provider hiring is complete and the average daily census is down. Families also get more one-on-one time with doctors and have expanded access to subspecialties without traveling to Nashville or Atlanta, officials said.
Other benefits of the new staffing include the ability for babies to have eye surgery in Chattanooga. Providers can also perform bronchoscopies in the nursery itself without having to go to the operating room.
Officials said the NICUs will continue to improve as they work toward full participation in a national quality database, helping them benchmark themselves against national centers.
Contact Elizabeth Fite at efite@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6673.