Public Employee Press

Bloomberg axe hits health care - again
HHC ends baby births at Bronx hospital

DC37, members of the state Nurses Association and local politicians gathered in protest Aug. 12 when North Central Bronx Hospital suddenly shuttered its labor and delivery and newborn baby intensive care units.

"This closing is a major concern for our members here and for families in this area," said DC 37 Field Operations Director Barbara Edmonds.

Protesters at the lunchtime rally blamed Mayor Bloomberg for putting North Bronx families at risk by forcing them to travel farther to deliver their babies. The nearest hospital is 5 to 10 minutes away by car, critical minutes that could mean the difference between a safe delivery and a high-risk emergency that jeopardizes mother and child.

Last year NCB delivered 1,600 babies, 10 percent of all infants born in the Bronx.

Perinatal employees in Locals 420 and 1549, along with doctors and nurses from the two units, were redeployed to Jacobi Hospital and will maintain their job titles and seniority, Edmonds said.

DC 37 is fighting to save the critical services members at North Central Bronx Hospital provide for an especially vulnerable population. Closing the labor and delivery and neonatal units at NCB cuts labor and delivery services north of Pelham Parkway by 50 percent, according to the Nurses Association. The unions are also concerned about the impact the NCB unit closings will have on related care and women's health clinics as well as services at Jacobi and Lincoln hospitals.

In the last decade, HHC has cut costs by using more midwives and less OB-GYN doctors; medical malpractice lawsuits, some related to childbirths, cost the city more than $134 million in 2012, said a recent NY Daily News article. DC 37 has pressed HHC on staffing at city hospitals and clinics in contract negotiations.