Why does Mayo hospital want to send all the low-profit patients to Albert Lea and send our high-revenue patients to Austin?

Why would Austin build a new hospital when they have half as many hospital beds as Albert Lea and can’t fill the ones they have?

With Albert Lea having the only acute-care hospital in 4,200 square miles, how many of the 60,000 people we serve might run out of time if 23 more miles are added to their trip to the hospital?  Fog, blizzard and winter highway closures add to the problem.

Who would pick a hodgepodge, cobbled-together old hospital in Austin when they could recover in our beautiful, modern, well designed hospital on the lake.  Also, for many, it is a shorter and safer trip.

Can anyone believe that the merging of Naeve and Austin hospitals was anything other than Mayo’s way of voiding their agreement not to strip services out of Albert Lea without receiving agreement by a supermajority of the board?

Mayo says it is difficult to attract doctors and nurses to Albert Lea. Several doctors and nurses I have talked to recently have told me the could not bear working for the Mayo company any longer so they found a better place to work. They also decried the change from a patient-centric focus to a for-profit focus. Any lessons for Mayo here?

Tony Trow

Albert Lea