I describe here this New Jersey health-care-related authority, since I make passing reference to it near the end of Part 2 of my story on CPG, which is to come. [An update is included at the end. Another update was done 5/30/13, toward the end.]
The New Jersey State Health Planning Board is not a new type of entity. It appears to be a state advisory panel that now is based in Trenton, operating under the aegis of the Department of Health and Senior Services and serving the state commissioner of health; and apparently it directs ad hoc “boards” to travel to localities specifically to have hearings on, with an eye to approving, some health-care facility’s new status. The main objective in such hearings is to decide on granting a “Certificate of Need,” which is a sort of state endorsement, or ratification, of the rationale for a health-care entity to have a certain status.
In the 1990s, this board function was delegated to a wider sort of organization: a set of per-region boards, with the state divided into several regions for the purpose. Each region had its board, which comprised professionals of various sorts (including one or more health-care practitioner) as well as laypeople and some direct representative of the state government. The one board I was familiar with was the one that served my own area: the Region One Health Planning [Local] Advisory Board, “Region One” encompassing part or all of Sussex County, Morris County, and other neighboring areas (by my rough recollection).
This board had its own paid secretary and local office, which was in Randolph, N.J. It had started in 1992, and I first started going to its periodic meetings in 1995, maybe 1994, and this was as an interested member of the public; I was not on the board, though I think at one point I requested to be considered to be a lay member. I last attended a meeting of this board in, I think, 1997; and that was also the year I wrote a locally published news article on this board, not only with respect to a specific issue involving the Atlantic Health System at the time, but also with an eye to describing the board’s general function for purposes of public education.
This local-board system was disbanded in later years, possibly due to cost.
The authority for such a state board system to decide on whether to grant a Certificate of Need is not new. And usually, a Certificate of Need has reflected that there is a need to provide a new facility—say, a group practice in locality X, or a new division of a local hospital system. I think—my opinion as a layperson—that it’s unusual for a “Certificate of Need” to actually be sought to close down a facility, which was at issue in northwestern Sussex County when in the evening of yesterday, May 1, a hearing was held in Wantage Township on the possible reduction of services by the small, local hospital that used to be called Wallkill Valley [General?] Hospital and more recently was a division of Saint Clare’s Health System, a hospital network with its main facility in Denville, N.J., and currently supported in part by Colorado-based Catholic Health Initiatives. [Update 5/10/13: Following state approval, as noted in the earlier update below, effective in September 2012, the Wallkill Valley hospital became a satellite, round-the-clock/acute-care/outpatient facility. As a separate issue, the ownership situation shapes up this way: An agreement (tentatively) made in March 2012 to have the larger St. Clare's Health System, including Wallkill, bought by Ascension Health Care System of St. Louis fell apart by late summer 2012. Currently, there is a new agreement (in principle) for St. Clare's (including the Wallkill facility) to be bought by Prime Healthcare Services, based in California and owner of numerous hospitals throughout the U.S. This purchase is subject to ongoing state review and approval. All this update information is based on reports in the New Jersey Herald May 5, 2013, pp. A-1 and A-5, and The Star-Ledger, May 4, 2013, p. 6.]
[Update: Saint Clare's Health System received approval from the state for closure of inpatient services at the particular hospital just noted, on August 16, 2012, to be effective September 21, 2012. The small hospital, newly renamed, will continue other services it has offered. This according to a public announcement by Saint Clare's that has appeared a few times, including in the Sunday New Jersey Herald, August 26, 2012, p. A-5.]
