The recent story by Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) Health News run by Cardinal News regarding Ballad Health lacks integrity and does a disservice to readers. As a practicing emergency medicine physician, I find the story misleads the public about the realities in emergency departments across the United States and unfairly portrays Ballad Health as an outlier when it is not.
National reports have detailed higher emergency room (ER) wait times in virtually every hospital due to common reasons. While Ballad Health’s hospitals have seen wait times increase for these very same reasons, publicly available data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services show that Ballad Health ERs perform as well as, or better than, national averages — and some leading hospitals — for median wait times, stroke care and sepsis care. The American College of Emergency Physicians recently commended Ballad Health hospitals for their exemplary care, saying Ballad Health is “leading the way for how the nation cares for its emergency patients.”
Incredibly, the KFF Health News article ignored all this, opting instead to compare information from other hospitals that was several years old to Ballad Health’s recent ER data from the height of the respiratory season, which is not credible by any standard.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the nursing shortages throughout the U.S. are well-documented and KFF News has run stories detailing that post-acute facilities have limited admissions from hospitals, which has created a backlog in hospitals. Both issues have a compelling impact on the patient experience in an ER. Evidence provided to KFF Health News based on public news stories detailing long ER wait times in New England, Missouri, Texas, Michigan, Maryland and elsewhere were ignored, despite proof that these issues plague the entire industry.
The commonwealth of Virginia and state of Tennessee have attested, based on clear and convincing evidence, that Ballad Health is meeting its commitment to provide a public benefit, expanding access to low-income patients, reducing preventable hospital admissions by as much as 50%, increasing nurse wages by nearly double since 2019 and maintaining an “A” credit rating with a stable outlook by all three national credit rating agencies, all while rural and community hospitals continue to close throughout the country — Jellico Regional Hospital being the most recent on March 9, 2024. Ballad Health has not only maintained hospitals in each community it serves but reopened a shuttered hospital in Lee County, which was without a hospital for eight years.
Ballad Health is outperforming national benchmarks and other high quality, reputable hospitals, yet its efforts to improve ER patient experience continue. It has increased nursing wages, is opening child care centers near hospitals to support staff and has reduced nursing turnover to below the national average. These efforts are why Ballad Health’s ER performance continues to improve and is as good as, or better than, the national averages and other leading hospitals.
Health policy reporting should be based on integrity, not false narratives. Ballad Health seeks serious solutions to the problems impacting access to healthcare, and we join colleagues across the U.S. in this effort. The reporting by KFF News was neither serious, nor credible.
Disclosure: Ballad Health is one of our donors, but donors have no say in news decisions; see our policy.
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Dr. Clay Runnels is a board-certified emergency medicine physician and leads Ballad Health’s physician leadership structure as chief physician executive. Runnels has oversight of clinical services, health research and graduate medical education. He serves as chair of the board of directors of the Tennessee Medical Foundation and has served as chair of the Tennessee Regents Physician Engagement Committee for the American College of Healthcare Executives.