By KRISTINE deLEON/The Oregonian/OregonLive
Samaritan Health Services’ maternity care services at its Lincoln City and Lebanon hospitals are on the chopping block.
The Corvallis-based nonprofit health network is evaluating whether to close the maternity ward at Samaritan North Lincoln Hospital and the Girod Birth Center at Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital.
In addition to Lincoln City and Lebanon, Samaritan has hospitals in Newport, Corvallis and Albany.
Nurses say they were notified of the potential closures last week and that the health system would seek community feedback before any decisions are made. The Samaritan board, however, is scheduled to meet Wednesday in Corvallis.
Samaritan declined to provide the number of births at the Lincoln City hospital or how many staff could be affected.
In March, then-Samaritan chief executive officer Doug Boysen told The Lund Report that finances in Oregon health care appear untenable statewide and that it was Samaritan’s “duty” to seek growth while considering possibilities such as a merger, finding an outside partner, or a sale.
“All options are on the table,” Boysen said. “It’s a really uncertain environment right now and we are looking at all different potential options to make sure that Samaritan is sustainable into the future.”
Boysen resigned this month and was replaced by Marty Cahill, who had been chief operating officer of Samaritan and once worked in Lincoln City.
In a statement Thursday, Cahill said Samaritan has been rethinking its operations and how to stay financially viable and identified several clinical areas — women and children’s services, general surgery, orthopedics and urology — for potential changes.
“To be sustainable, we must have reliable and efficient operations that are able to withstand the challenges occurring within the health care industry,” he said. “No final decisions have been made. We will evaluate these new approaches deliberately and carefully over the next few months.”
The Lincoln City and Lebanon hospitals combined delivered just over 200 babies in 2023 — fewer than Samaritan’s other hospitals in Corvallis, Albany and Newport, according to the state’s latest yearly data. The number of deliveries have declined over the past decade across the state.
Closing Samaritan’s Lincoln City maternity unit would leave Lincoln County’s 51,000 residents with one birthing center – 28 miles to the south at Samaritan Pacific Communities Hospital in Newport.
Closing Samaritan’s birth center at its Lebanon hospital would leave one maternity unit – in Albany – for all of Linn County, which has 132,000 residents.
Samaritan, like most other hospital chains in Oregon, is suffering financially due to a combination of rising operating costs, capacity issues and stagnant payments from insurance companies and government payers like Medicare and Medicaid.
Costs up, reimbursements down
According to the Hospital Association of Oregon, labor and supply costs at hospitals statewide have risen 40 percent since 2020 — faster than the rate of inflation. At the same time, the state’s Medicaid program now covers one in three Oregonians, but pays hospitals 56 cents for every dollar spent to provide care to its members, the group said in a recent report.
Nearly half of the state’s hospitals lost money on day-to-day operations in 2024, the hospital association said. As a result, many are looking to cut costs.
In a written statement for the hospital association report, Boysen said 75 percent of Samaritan’s payments come from Medicaid and Medicare but the company has seen minimal reimbursement rate increases.
“With expenses far outpacing revenues, the math simply does not work,” Boysen wrote. “With this unstable health care environment, it is becoming harder for small, rural independent health care systems to survive.”
Maternity wards have been closing across the state and all over the country in recent years. Reimbursements for maternity care are typically bundled payments — a flat rate for services provided throughout a pregnancy, which providers say often falls short of covering the costs to provide the care. Obstetrics also has among the highest rates of malpractice suits, which drives up insurance costs for hospitals.
In 2023, Saint Alphonsus Health System closed its birth center in Baker City, despite community opposition. Legacy Health also moved to close its maternity unit at its Gresham hospital that year, only to be forced by the state to reverse its decision.
Community members have started a Change.org petition to keep Samaritan’s Lebanon birth center open. As of Thursday afternoon, it had over 1,500 signatures. Nurses are planning a rally at Avery Square in Corvallis on May 27 to protest the closures.
- The Lincoln Chronicle contributed to this report. Kristine de Leon covers consumer health data enterprise stories for The Oregonian/OregonLive. Reach her at kdeleon@oregonian.com.
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