Many others, especially those in rural areas, will go out of business.
This story is Part 15 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Ind.
How will health care reform impact Gary and its citizens?
While the Republican-dominated U.S. House of Representatives voted to repeal the Accountable Care Act of 2010, the U.S. Senate isn’t likely to follow suit, meaning the landmark health reform legislation will continue to change the way many Americans receive health care.
This story is Part 14 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Ind.
When Shantray Hooks, of Gary, lost her job as a restaurant cook in August, she didn’t know how she would pay for doctor visits.
“I had no health insurance and I couldn’t afford to pay a doctor,” said Hooks, 29, who was diagnosed with diabetes several years ago.
A doctor referred her to the Community Health Net of Gary, a federally qualified community health center that provides comprehensive primary care health services and charges on a sliding fee scale for services.
This story is Part 12 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Ind.
John Grimm knows the city of Gary faces severe financial problems and didn’t expect city crews to plow all of its streets overnight after the recent blizzard.
But Grimm, the executive director of the South Shore Health & Rehabilitation Center in Gary, said during and after the storm city leaders failed to protect some of Gary’s most vulnerable residents when its crews neglected to plow the alleys and streets surrounding the nursing home.
Grimm said for an entire week the streets around the long-term care facility were not plowed, which he said “put the lives of many residents in jeopardy, as ambulances and emergency medical services and other medical providers were not able to access the facility.”
This story is Part 11 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Ind.
Nearly 33 years after the federal government designated Gary a health professional shortage area and 17 years after federal health authorities qualified it as a medically underserved area, Gary continues to suffer from physician shortages.
Those shortages are partially to blame for the poor health status of many Gary citizens, according to local doctors and hospital officials.
Gary is home to disproportionately high numbers of severely ill patients suffering from multiple potentially life threatening conditions, including heart disease, kidney failure, diabetes, hypertension, obesity and asthma.
This story is Part 10 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Ind.
Methodist Hospitals’ financial turnaround has impressed hospital analysts and bond ratings agencies.
In May, New York bond-rating firm Standard & Poor’s changed its outlook on Methodist’s long-term bonds from negative to stable, reflecting its “improved operating performance and an improved balance sheet in fiscal 2009.”
Project: Diabetes 'scared me to death'
This story is Part 9 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Ind.
Dorothy Manley knew something was wrong nine years ago because whenever she ate sweets, she grew sleepy.
Manley, 77, of Gary, visited a local health fair and was advised to see her doctor.
“That’s when I found out I had diabetes,” said Manley, a former U.S. Postal Service supervisor who retired with 30 years of service in Chicago. The news frightened her because a former neighbor with uncontrollable diabetes lost an arm and both legs to amputation.
This story is Part 7 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Indiana.
Every dollar invested in a community health center yields returns beyond that investment, said an official of the association representing such centers in Indiana.
“Not only do we provide care to people without access to health services, but we improve the economy,” said Phil Morphew, chief executive officer of the Indiana Primary Care Association.
This story is Part 6 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Indiana.
In the next three years Methodist Hospitals Northlake in Gary faces perhaps the greatest challenge of its 101-year history.
Health care reform is expected to reduce the rolls of uninsured Gary patients and expand health care access to thousands. But by 2014 the city’s only acute care hospital must figure out how to replace millions of dollars in government funding scheduled to disappear.
This story is Part 5 of a 15-part series that examines health care needs in Gary, Ind.
Once a white washboard with dry erasable markers kept track of the patients in the emergency room at Methodist Hospitals’ Northlake Campus in Gary. The board listed the staff on duty and noted the patients and their ER bed numbers.
Like so many other things in health care, that technology is outdated, replaced by a computerized tracking system produced by the Verona, Wis.-based company that created Methodist’s electronic health record and health care information technology system, EPIC.
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