WORCESTER – Nashoba Valley Medical Center in Ayer will close at midnight Saturday. Don’t count on a last-minute buyer stepping in to save it.
That assessment came from Dr. Robert Goldstein, commissioner of the state Department of Health, during a stop in Worcester on Wednesday to mark International Opioid Awareness Day.
Nashoba will close its doors to patients at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, according to Goldstein. The patient curfew makes sense, he said, because there isn’t enough time until midnight to triage new emergency cases and transfer them to other hospitals.
Nashoba’s bankrupt owner, Steward Health Care, notified the state late last month that it intends to close Nashoba on Aug. 31. Steward claims no qualified buyer has applied for Nashoba.
Ambulance on standby
Steward’s closure plan drew a “stern” response from the state health department, said Goldstein, who expected further responses from Steward by Thursday. After reviewing the documents, there is a disagreement between the parties regarding ambulance coverage at Nashoba after Aug. 31. The state health department requires Steward to park an ambulance outside the emergency department for a week after the closure. Steward told the state that would take two days.
There is a hotline for Nashoba patients to receive information about accessing services after the hospital closes. The number provided by Steward is (617) 789-2228 and calls are taken Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. The service went live Monday and will run for at least 30 days.
Change of strategy
That number seems to align with the state’s shift from ending the shutdown to moving on to the next steps. “We’ve really focused our energy and attention on making sure there’s a safe plan in place post-shutdown and what that will entail,” Goldstein said.
That includes working with area hospitals, including UMass Memorial in Leominster and Emerson Hospital in Concord, to ensure they have the necessary services to accommodate Nashoba’s patients, he said. Services include urgent care and emergency room space.
Fire and emergency services are informed of routes they can take to transport patients to alternative hospitals. They are informed that they have contracts with these hospitals and that their trucks are adequately stocked with supplies.
The safety plan also includes informing patients at Nashoba where they can get medical care after the closure.
Why not part of the $700 million for Nashoba?
When asked about reports that the state was willing to pump $700 million into six Steward hospitals in Massachusetts to keep them running until they were taken over by nonprofit health systems, and why the same would not be done for Nashoba, Goldstein said there were buyers for those hospitals but not for Nashoba.
“The state is not necessarily going to support these other hospitals in the long run, we are just helping to build a bridge to the new operator,” Goldstein said. “Nashoba Valley Medical Center does not yet have a new operator, and so the support the state would have to provide would be unlimited.”
UMass Memorial could be a potential buyer, according to John McDonough, a professor at Harvard TH Chan School for Public Health and a former state legislator. McDonough’s sources told him UMass had been in talks with state officials about a purchase, but the outcome was “less than optimal.”
It has also been reported that UMass has floated the idea of converting Nashoba’s emergency department into an urgent care center or nursing facility. UMass Memorial said in a prepared statement that it has no plans to bid on any of Steward’s hospitals.
The administration of Steward and Gov. Maura T. Healey has not received a plan from UMass regarding Nashoba, Goldstein said, and he is not aware of anything in the works to make it happen before Aug. 31.
UMass: Important role to play
However, Goldstein believes UMass has an important role to play in ensuring Nashoba’s patients have access to quality health care even after the hospital closes.
“I hope they want to get involved and do something to support the residents. But I don’t know what that will look like.”
In the Nashoba Valley you can’t keep the same course
Goldstein reiterated that the Nashoba Hospital will close on Saturday because there is no buyer, but he believes this is an opportunity to look at improving health care in the Nashoba Valley region.
“I think if we end up with exactly the same thing that we’ve had in Ayer for the last 100 years, then we haven’t done our job,” Goldstein said. “Our job is to think about what the community needs now, what services, what types of health care and what locations, and work to make that happen.”
“So I can’t tell you exactly what it will look like in six months, but I believe we have a lot of interested people who want to do the right thing for Nashoba Valley and the residents. We’re all going to work together to get there.”
Contact Henry Schwan at [email protected]. Follow him on X: @henrytelegram.
