It’s been one year since PeaceHealth Sacred Heart shut down the only emergency room in Eugene, and started rerouting patients to its Riverbend hospital in Springfield.
KLCC's Rachael McDonald spoke with KLCC reporter Nathan Wilk about the transition, and the current efforts to increase healthcare access in the region.
Rachael McDonald: Nathan, can you remind us why PeaceHealth closed its Eugene location in the first place?
Nathan Wilk: Part of the reasoning there was cost. PeaceHealth said it was losing $2 million a month at University District, and the facility was being underutilized.
Also, PeaceHealth Oregon’s Chief Hospital Executive Jim McGovern told me there was a severe nursing shortage at the time, and the closure let PeaceHealth consolidate the staff they did have.
Jim McGovern: “Before we closed University District, we were closing anywhere from 40 to 80 beds at Riverbend because of lack of staffing. We were struggling to staff both emergency departments, whether that was University District or Riverbend, where on some night shifts, we would look at the schedule and see three nurses where we needed eight to ten."
Nathan Wilk: The decision to close the ER received a lot of pushback, including from the Oregon Nurses Association and Gov. Tina Kotek. Some critics expressed concerns about how Eugene patients would get to Springfield, what would happen during a natural disaster, and the potential for overcrowding at Riverbend.
McDonald: It’s been a year now. What can you tell us about how the ER department is working today?
Wilk: There are definitely concerns about bed access and wait-times at Riverbend. The Oregon Nurses Association recently released a survey of patients, quoting some respondents who said they’d spent upwards of 10 hours in the waiting room.
Kevyn Paul was a long-time nurse at the ER in Eugene, before transferring to Riverbend after last year’s closure. She told me having someone wait as much as 2 or 3 hours at University District would have been outside of the norm.
At Riverbend, Paul said beds elsewhere in the hospital are sometimes closed due to staffing issues, clogging-up availability in the ER.
Kevyn Paul: “Say, someone comes in and they have pneumonia and they need to stay in the hospital for a couple of days. Well, sometimes that couple of days ends up being in the emergency department because there's no bed available upstairs as an inpatient.”
Nathan Wilk: McGovern, the Hospital Executive, told me 90% of ER patients wait less than four hours for a room, starting from the time they’re checked in.
McGovern said PeaceHealth has tried to reduce wait-times by moving triaging and some healthcare services into the lobby. He said patients may be able to get their concerns addressed there, and go home.
Jim McGovern: “It's not your traditional ER flow. But we're not in a traditional world anymore.”
Nathan Wilk: However, Paul argues these practices can leave patients at risk of deteriorating, because it’s more difficult to effectively monitor a patient’s health in the lobby, and some procedures aren’t safe to do there.
Kevyn Paul: “It's just very hard on the staff to not be able to provide the level of care that they are used to, that is considered to be standard in the industry."
Paul said many of the nurses who came from University District have since left the ER, including herself. McGovern told me staffing in the ER is better than it was a year ago, but it still has a ways to go.
Both McGovern and Paul note that all this is happening as primary care providers have left Oregon Medical Group, putting more pressure on PeaceHealth’s services.
McDonald: What is being done now to address some of these issues?
Wilk: This year, Oregon lawmakers passed a bill to increase healthcare access in Eugene. It included over a million dollars for an additional ambulance crew, and had new measures to help hire nurses.
Critically, it also provides grant money to fund ER alternatives. The idea there is to help low-risk patients who don’t actually need Riverbend’s specialized services.
So, partners are working to extend hours for medication pick-ups, provide more same-day telehealth appointments, and staff mobile crisis teams that can transport people to services.
Eugene-Springfield Fire and PeaceHealth are also creating a new Alternative Response Unit, which will serve an area around downtown Eugene. It will provide medical assistance on-site, and take patients to Urgent Care or the Emergency Room only when needed.
McDonald: What could be coming further down the line in the future?
Wilk: PeaceHealth is planning to open a new rehab facility in Springfield in 2026, and a new behavioral health hospital in 2027. McGovern said that could help normalize demand in the emergency department.
Meanwhile, the McKenzie-Willamette Medical Center has announced it is considering opening a satellite emergency department in Eugene. In an email to KLCC, the provider said it’s now doing a feasibility study, and will develop further plans once that’s done.
Despite these possibilities, Paul told me it doesn’t look like there's an end in sight to the problems at Riverbend. She said she wishes PeaceHealth was taking more immediate action to remodel the ER, and create more space that the patients need right now.
