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Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Expensive American Hospitals - Does Toyota Make One?

In a town that seems to go to great lengths to hide its politics, the Janesville Gazette on Monday ran a McClatchy-Tribune article titled, “Politics can get you down.” Obviously you didn’t have to read the article to figure it out, but as long as you glanced the title I’m sure the Gazette felt comfortable with that reminder.


In Tuesday's Gazette, the paper dropped a five article bomb all written objectively by the same journalist in what appears to be part of giant 3-day Mercy Hospital promotion. The articles today centered around economic growth, the importance of the business community and finally, the compensation of its CEO.

There was a lot of side activity going on within the stories. For instance, Mercy has displaced GM as the largest single employer in the area and could spell political trouble for those over-paid democrats. And of course the ever present peer comparisons made to justify the salaries of white-collar positions including that of the CEO. Forward Janesville was described simply as “the communities private economic development organization” and not as a “special interest right-leaning institution” and all of the those interviewed just offered each other the kind of support and back-slapping one would expect at a “good ol’ boy” rally.

But two things stood out, number one, the Mercy executives interviewed and their supporters collecting multi-million dollar salaries expect criticism from the community and perhaps this blog for their multi-million dollar compensation packages. But they don’t care because they are busy people and do a lot for the community, they are irreplaceable and they deserve the money….period.

Mercy CEO Javon Bea collected $14 million in 2002 and was asked by the Gazette how the community would react to his salary.
JG Excerpt:
"Whatever they choose," he told the Gazette. "It depends on how you represent it, if you represent it accurately or not."—Javon Bea
Bea is one smart cookie. This is exactly how every civic leader and politician should respond to anything from the mainstream media before they answer their question. Has he been reading my blog? Don't worry Javon, the Gazette did a great job explaining it. Apparently Javon Bea deferred large parts of his salary for thirteen years, invested it during the Clinton 90’s and had the wherewithal to pull it all out before Bush came in, and walked away with $14 million. You know, he did what most of us Janevilleans do.

The story also revealed that it’s top five physicians earned an average of $1.1 million a year and that Mercy has 10 vice presidents whose average salary was $163,690 during the 2004-2005 fiscal year.

Regardless, I see problems with all of their salaries but I’ll let the Gazette attack them in their editorials like they would GM executives and their overpaid union workers. The second thing here is, this giant exposé or info-commercial or whatever you want to call it is really not newsworthy, it’s very lop-sided and the Gazette goes out of their way to defend anything that might appear extreme or excessive. Too bad Gazette journalists can’t spin like this for the Rock County Board, unions, teacher health insurance or Democrats just for balance.

The only question I have after reading it is: Why is healthcare so expensive? Refresh me.

Mercy Gazette Promotional page

11 comments:

Unknown said...

lou. the entire mercy/gazette package does look like a work of collaboration, bought and paid for and presented like a news piece. good work!!

Lou Kaye said...

Bought and paid for....perhaps. I won't go that far but the full page ads by Mercy and the web banner ads sure give that impression. My observation is not about Mercy, it's a good healthcare organization with lots of employees. This is about business propaganda and faux news.

Two Fisted Slopper said...

Dude all you do is bitch about the Gazette and Forward Janesville time to get a new hobby

Lou Kaye said...

Did you forget about the Messenger, nearly all Republicans and wealthy folk collecting government hand-outs, soldiers needlessly dying, the Iraq war and Bush, crooked politicians, Big Oil, high taxes, outsourcing, imports, low wage jobs, and national deficits. I can't do a thing about 'em, but I have a lot of fun trying. Life must be pretty good if all you have to whine about is Ned Yost.

Two Fisted Slopper said...

Hey I respect your opinions truely I do. They may in probably 97% are not mine. I just do not see the Chamber of Commerce in Janesville being a bad thing. Yeah they are all business owners they will probably do things to help and grow their business. If you are going to tell me these people are detremental to the community because the do something like VOLUNTEER in schools, you really need some help.

I do not see much about the Beloit Paper in the blog, is the reason being they agree with you??

Anonymous said...

Mercy needs lots of employees because they have a bigger turnover rate than McDonalds. Their doctors regularly quit and they treat their staff atrociously. Ask Javon how much it cost the hospital to furnish his office. Or better yet, ask him about how much it cost to ship all that italian marble flooring back because the color wasn't just quite right. Mercy needs the good PR, there's alot of folks that hate them.

Lou Kaye said...

Wait a minute. This is an area of concern I've always felt needs to be talked about. The Gazette happens to be the towns newspaper, people naturally gravitate to them for all the typical community gossip, etc., and local ads. That's their business, the same with Forward Janesville, they are the towns chamber of commerce, they do etc., but both of them have a serious right-wing plank. Yet, both of them insist they don't. On a national scale their story is small and my stories may appear small, but it's very powerful stuff locally. And if they are spreading republicanism in grade schools, I DO have a problem with that. In a supposed non-political non-partisan town like Janesville, they have control despite never being elected. To go along just to get along is wrong. We all blog for a reason and these are some of mine.

The Gazette/Mercy story is written like a regular news piece but it is obviously promotional, and the appearance of a quid pro quo is everywhere. Whatever the Gazette earned on the story is their business but they owe a statement to their readers about disclosure and collaboration on stories like this, so readers know what's going on. If they just did their business and contributed to the community that's one thing, but there is evidence of otherwise everywhere.

I do appreciate your visit even if we don't agree, I don't agree with the wife half the time.

Anonymous said...

Anyone can nit pick, jaw jack and jibber jabber about everything they want, but the truth of the matter is that Javon Bea probably saved Mercy from going under in 1990 and continued on to build a great hospital with the latest medical equipment and staffed it with excellent doctors and support staff. It appears that some need something to be upset about and it appears it is salary this go around. Rather than worry about his salary, you need to worry about what will happen to Janesville when GM and it's local suppliers leave. All of a sudden you will have a doctors office with a little portable x-ray unit to get your medical treatments and diagnostics from (kind of kidding here) but when you need an up to date hospital and you dont have it, that salary issue will soon be forgotten. Perhaps Javon needs someone to give him a little humor....and perhaps that is an insider joke.

Lou Kaye said...

Why is it we need insurance to get "good" health care? Insurance is nothing more than a legalized Ponzi scheme. If there is any industry that has priced itself out of existence - its the health care industry. Yet we continue to allow this to happen because they hold the power to blackmail us for the most sacred collateral in our lives - our lives.

Example: A person in relatively good health but without health insurance goes to their regular doctor for annual check ups and at age 45, the doctor suggests his patient to get a colonscopy. The doctor proceeds to set-up the appointment, etc. Days later, the patient gets a phone call from the office with instructions and dates. The patient finally asks, "how much is this going to cost?" The person at the office says she has no figures for that. After several more phone calls and a slight run around, the tab for the colonscopy is pegged at $4,800. The patient said she can't afford and cancels the appointment. End of story. But it shouldn't be.

When the doc assumed the money was there, his attitude towards his patient's health care was very different, the list of future check-ups was long and expensive. To deny anyone a procedure after recommending it be done because they can't afford it should be a criminal offense. The American health care industry is responsible for bleeding our domestic economy dry. They hold too much collateral.

Anonymous said...

Lou my friend there are those of us who may or may not work at Mercy any longer who did try to get the real story printed in the Gazette and we were never given any space - I guess Mr. Bea is correct it does "depend on how you represent it whether you represent it accurately or not."

Hey has anyone read that book called Coronary?

Anonymous said...

A friend of mine went into the hospital with a minor, VERY minor illness (dehyrdation, easily taken care of with a few bags of fluid) and ended up with not ONE but TWO rare diseases!! Yet Javon Bea sits in his ivory tower, raking in money he doesn't deserve. It said recently in an article that he "is very open and communicates well with everyone" however, when a meeting was set up to speak to him, he "wasn't available" and never is. He doesn't care of the patients, all he cares about is the money.

Why do you think a LOT of patients who were at Mercy transferred to the new Dean Hospital?? It's not because of the nurses, but because they weren't getting the care they felt they needed.

And I agree, visit Mercy Manor (5th flr, hosp), look at the nightstands which look like they were drug out of a dump and shoved in the room. Look at the lack of nursing staff because Bea is being paid a fortune, instead of paying for more nurses to take care of the patients.

Why doesn't Bea and all those "board of directors" work on the floors for one day, they wouldn't last. Give that high salary to the ones who DO WORK HARD, and it's definitely not someone who sits behind a desk, smiling and trying to make things look better than they actually are.

Bea needs to open his eyes and think about the patients care instead of the money aspect. Who cares how much money he thinks he deserves, its the nursing staff doing all the work FOR HIM. At least most of them you can talk to freely without being made to feel like you mean nothing to them.

Bea, learn compassion, put yourself in the place of your patients, learn about the real world, instead of your ivory tower..maybe clean off the windows a little bit and see what's actually happening in that place.

Maybe that's why noone was allowed to speak to one of the State investigators because they were always assigned a doctor to accompany them everywhere in the hospital. Yes it's true, we tried to talk to them, and there was always a doctor, or one of the "higher ups" with them.

Nice maneuvering, Bea, you are real approachable, maybe if you were down to "our level" you'd see things a whole lot better. Remove the rose colored glasses and see for yourself.

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