e.g., Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Camden, NJ and many others. I bet most people have seen or even been to these places. What gives??
In: Economics
As CMO for a large Catholic hospital and medical director of a Baptist one I feel qualified to weigh in on this one.
At least in our region, most hospitals started as church or convent based infirmaries. Sometime in the ?50-60’s (before my time) they transitioned to stand alone hospitals and began shifting from clergy administration to physician administration. Around the 80’s-90’s CMS (Medicare) had a big push for bigger health systems with “professional” administrators and physician leadership was gradually replaced by business types to meet new reporting requirements but then increasingly to focus on financial metric performance.
So we went from compassion based healthcare systems to science based healthcare systems to profit based. All while keeping the original name and religious connotations. And tax free status (though I believe this would be equally possible without the religious naming convention).
As an example this Catholic hospital still has a nunnery attached with dozens of rooms too small for even a twin bed (so they sit empty), and our literal last nun (who was not from the US) would just roam the halls offering hand touches and prayer until she passed away during covid. The nursing stations each have a locked cubby built into the wall that has emergency Bible and holy water for last rites. That now no one is qualified to use.
For what it’s worth there is a slowly rising trend toward physician leadership again in hospitals and healthcare systems, with remarkably positive early results.
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