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As noted before, there was an
increasing number of surgical cases referred
here from the doctors in Edon, Edgerton,
Montpelier and Bryan. A review of that
situation in I93-i showed that 30% of the
operations done at Angola were on Williams
County residents since there was no hospital
in that county. Following some talk
and speculation regarding this fact, I was
given an invitation to meet with seven or
eight members of the Montpelier Chamber of
Commerce with the thought in mind of
establishing a hospital there with their
active support. We discussed possible
building sites, and I am still very grateful
for the welcome they gave me including also
encouragement from Doctors H.W. Wertz, W.L.
Hogue, W.H. Steel, H.C. Bechtol, and H.
Luxan who had been sending surgical cases to
Angola.
By 1935,
and after a number of exploratory visits,
the city of Bryan seemed to be the logical
location for a new hospital. The good
wishes of several doctors were a potent
factor in the decision. In the
forefront but now gone, were Doctors D.S.
Burns of Bryan, H.L. Prouty of West Unity
and Doctors A. J. Goll and C.J. Goll of
Stryker.
The two
and a half vacant lots east of Garver Park
were purchased for the hospital site and
Leroy Bradley of Fort Wayne selected as the
architect. To save an additional
$3,500 at this time, Dr. Biddle's one
remaining lot extending to High Street was
not bought until three hospital additions
later, when we had to pay $35,000 for it
with a house then on it, plus and equal
amount for the adjacent house and lot
directly east, plus $6,000 for a 20 ft.
easement.
A
serviceable small steel and brick hospital
with terrazzo floors was erected and
furnished containing 17 patient beds, an
operating suite and accommodations for
nurses' living quarters. Rose Johnson,
R.N., with a small hard working group
including Miss Gertie Buchs formed the
nursing staff.
This
building, constructed and furnished just 10
years after the Angola hospital was opened,
again took all of my savings amounting to
over $40,000 but was paid for without asking
for or receiving any aid.
Dr. Denver
Burns of Bryan, a good radiologist, was
invited to move his x-ray equipment into the
hospital and head that department. I
was very fortunate also in getting Dr.
Russell K. Ameter, who had already worked
with me in Fort Wayne and Angola -- a young
and brilliant man -- to move to Bryan as
resident surgeon. He was followed at a
later date by Dr. John R. Riesen.
Immediately, on completion in 1936 of the
Bryan hospital, it was included with the
parent one in Angola and the two were
incorporated in 1937 in Indiana as a
not-for-profit institution under the name,
Cameron Hospitals, later modified to Cameron
Memorial Hospitals, Inc., and the Ohio
Secretary of State issued the permit
necessary to allow us to operate in Ohio.
Until this
time, I was the sole owner of the two
hospitals, but now was anxious to gain a few
advantages held by accredited not-for-profit
charitable corporations. Gifts to such
corporations are tax deductible, within
certain limits, and such institutions are
somewhat sheltered from certain damage
suits. One might note here that almost
the first visitor to the Bryan hospital was
the assessor who placed us on the tax list
there we have remained these 30 years, now
paying some $5,000 locally each year in
spite of carrying a heavy charity load for
patients unable to pay. This rule
reverses a dictum of President Cleveland who
reminded some his constituents seeking
government jobs that it was the duty of the
people to support the government and not of
the latter to support the people. In
other words, in most places people pay taxes
to support a hospital, not the reverse.
Since the
beginning, the facilities of these two
hospitals have been open to all licensed
doctors for all work within their
competence, and to all persons needing
hospital care regardless of ability to pay.
To manage
these two growing institutions and maintain
their solvency, required the strictest
economy and at least one life saving
innovation. Even 30 years ago it was
easy to see several serious faults which
added needlessly to the cost of medical
care. At this time, here and
elsewhere, each doctor had his own office
with his own waiting rooms, laboratories,
business and collections, telephone service
and assistants. This office was far
from the hospital and a car was needed to
reach it. The hospitals had their
waiting rooms, diagnostic laboratories,
x-ray, other equipment, record and
collection service, and much to often, no
doctor there for increasing emergencies.
In connection with these facts, medical
economists knew as well as Federal Tax men
that on the average 25% to 40% of a doctor's
gross income was a tax deductible expense.
It was then plain that a hospital with its
own waiting room, office help, telephones,
and call system with comparatively little
extra expense could offer completely
furnished offices and help doctors return
for an equitable part, 25% to 30%, of there
gross incomes. This furnished a major
source of income to the hospital at a
relatively small expense. The revenue
Service lost nothing in tax returns and the
doctors were nearly always in hospital where
they easily served out and inside patients
without extra driving and much loss in time.
Sad to
relate, after 28 years of this very simple
and economical way of combining doctor and
hospital service, the Revenue Service ruled
it would have to be discontinued and the old
complicated and detailed schedules of
individual rental, heat, maintenance,
telephone and office and collection services
reinstated. Such is one of the
penalties of super-government, which
contributes to the increasing cost of
medical care.
In great
contrast to this, it is a real pleasure to
record and again return profound thanks for
a most unexpected major gift which came to
us, which we took as a real compliment for
our way of running hospitals. Without
any previous communications of any sort, in
1956, a telegram was delivered to us in
Angola stating that since out Hospitals were
on the list of approved not-for-profit
corporations which received not tax support,
we would receive promptly a check for
$28,000 to be used for needed hospital
improvement -- signe by The Ford Foundation.
What pleasure and help this gave during some
dark days! And what great good this
Foundation is doing for all people of the
world.
Along with
rapidly increasing business in each
hospital, and some streaks of good fortune
coming our way, as noted above, it is with
much chagrin that I must record also some
serious expensive blunders into which we
were lead due to inability, especially on my
part, to judge correctly future changes in
medical practice. Within just two or
three years after the end of World War II, a
sever shortage of doctors developed in many
of the smaller towns where there was no
hospital. Prominent citizens at
different times from Ashley, Hudson,
Fremont, Edon and Edgerton called on us to
help in getting a new docto to locate where
none was left at all or possibly one older
doctor really wanting help. It did
seem like a logical adventure for the
corporation to purchase a doctor's office or
home with office in each of these town and
offer them rent free for a few years to
attract a young doctor to locate there and
use our nearby hospital facilities. So
far so good; we got a new young man for each
place, but so great was the demand
elsewhere, that each in turn moved away
without either paying rent or purchasing his
house and office. We profited somewhat
for a while in a little increase in hospital
and surgical services, but were soon left
with deserted homes on our hands which are
not all sold and paid for to this day.
It is almost impossible now to get a doctor
to locate even in prosperous towns without a
hospital. This was something new, and
we had to learn it the expensive way.
To
accommodate the increasing demand for
hospital and diagnostic facilities, two
sizable strictly modern additions have been
made to the Angola hospital since the last
war giving it a 51 bed capacity and two
larger additions put up at the Bryan
hospital, costing $420,000 and $330,00
respectively unfurnished, with a 60 bed
capacity, plus offices for a superior group
of nine medical and dental doctors.
Both hospitals have been accredited by the
Join Accreditation Commission.
Three
years ago the annual expense of running the
two hospitals was $650,000, 70% of this was
paid to the 76 employees at Angola and 80 at
Bryan. The cost of modern hospital
construction has increased steadily and now
amounts to $30,000 for every bed available
for a patient, and the average per diem cost
of room and care for one patient is $36.50
compared to $4.37 in 1927.
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