ASHEVILLE – A coalition of local elected officials, physicians, nurses, clergy and others are pressing HCA Healthcare to increase staffing levels at Mission Hospital in Asheville or sell the hospital to a nonprofit health system.
The demand comes on the heels of a patient death that occurred in an emergency department bathroom in February. The group, Reclaim Healthcare WNC, believes the death could been have been prevented if the hospital had more staff working when the death occurred.
The Citizen Times previously reported that one Mission staff member had been terminated after an internal investigation, which is ongoing.
The group, which formed in 2024, is also calling on HCA to release more information about what it says was another preventable patient death that allegedly occurred at Mission in January.
“We need answers from HCA about the connection between these patient deaths and staffing and how they are going to prevent this from happening in the future,” state Sen. Julie Mayfield said at a Feb. 28 press conference Reclaim Healthcare WNC held in downtown Asheville.
A Mission Health spokesperson did not respond to questions from the Citizen Times regarding Reclaim Healthcare WNC’s allegations and demands.
Mayfield said HCA is making a “calculated decision on a daily basis to increase its profits by understaffing and putting our families and neighbors at risk.”
Mayfield’s claim also is at the center of lawsuits and other complaints filed against HCA, the Nashville-based health system that bought former nonprofit Mission in 2019 for $1.5 billion.
In 2023, when he was serving as North Carolina’s attorney general, now-Gov. Josh Stein filed a lawsuit alleging HCA breached its asset purchase agreement by discontinuing certain aspects of Mission’s oncology services and emergency and trauma services, without authorization from the hospital’s advisory board. The complaint highlights deficient staffing and long wait times in the Mission Hospital emergency department, a “manufactured” bed shortage and the consequences of medical transport services, citing Citizen Times reporting as evidence.
HCA is also facing a federal lawsuit filed by Buncombe County alleging staffing cuts have increased the hospital’s emergency department wait times so much that county EMS workers are forced to treat patients in ambulances, Mission waiting rooms and ER hallways, until Mission can accept them.
At the Feb. 28 press conference, Riceville Volunteer Fire Department Chief Tom Kelly raised similar concerns, claiming his team and the patients it treats are facing extended wait times due to staffing shortages at Mission.
Both suits are still ongoing.
In January 2024, the Citizen Times reported that state investigators identified several “immediate jeopardy” incidents at Mission Hospital, the most serious deficiency regulators can assign and can result in the loss of Medicare and Medicaid payments to a hospital.
According to a letter outlining the deficiencies, state officials found that hospital nursing staff did not quickly accept and monitor emergency department patients, leading to delays in care, and preventing nurses from identifying and responding to changes in patient conditions. The letter also indicated that staffing deficiencies led to delays in treatment for patients.
“The cumulative effects of these practices resulted in an unsafe environment for ED patients,” the letter read.
A federal report later obtained by the Citizen Times revealed that hospital missteps led to multiple patient deaths.
Corrections made by Mission ended the immediate jeopardy status on Feb. 28, 2024.
“I’ve seen firsthand that the hospital’s capable of staffing our hospital appropriately,” Ashley Bunting, a registered nurse who works in Mission’s emergency department said during the Reclaim Healthcare WNC press conference. “When they were in danger of losing their Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement last year, we suddenly got the resources.”
But the changes didn’t last, Bunting said, claiming the hospital has “slid back to the very same conditions we fought so hard to get out of.”
Those dire conditions were apparent this week, when the hospital’s emergency department hallways were crowded with patients on stretchers, Bunting said.
“HCA has completely ignored our warnings,” she said. “We have spoken out, we have called for action, and they have chosen to do nothing. And when nurses are ignored, patients suffer.”
More:Mission Hospital employee fired after patient dies in ER; investigation ongoing
More:HCA’s Mission Health closes WNC’s only long-term acute care hospital
Jacob Biba is the Helene recovery reporter at the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA TODAY Network. Email him at jbiba@citizentimes.com.
Français 
English