Profile of Grady Memorial Hospital highlights the difficulties faced by safety net facilities

The New York Times: Illegal immigrants say an effort to close the dialysis center at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta could synch their only source of care. The closure may foreshadow broader problems "safety-net" hospitals could face under the health care overhaul. "Grady is one of many public hospitals that have been battered by the recession as the number of uninsured has mounted. New York City's public hospital system is eliminating 400 positions and closing some children's mental health programs, pharmacies and clinics. University Medical Center in Las Vegas has closed its mammography center and outpatient oncology clinic. Public hospital officials are concerned that the health care legislation being negotiated in Washington could worsen their plight before making it better. Under bills traveling through both houses of Congress, as the number of uninsured declines there would be commensurate reductions in Medicaid subsidies to hospitals that provide large amounts of uncompensated care" (Sack, 9/23).

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This article was reprinted from khn.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.