Merit Health Central CEO David Henry is leaving South Jackson Hospital to take the helm at Merit Health Madison after downsizing and moving many of the hospital’s services to the company’s suburban facilities such as Merit Health River Oaks.
He started in the new role on Monday.
When reached by phone last week, Henry referred all questions to the company’s marketing department.
Barry Moss, Merit Health’s vice president of operations, will serve as the Jackson hospital’s interim CEO until a permanent leader is identified, according to Alicia Carpenter, Merit Health’s director of marketing.
“A search will begin immediately for this individual, and hospital leaders, board members, as well as medical staff members will be included in the search,” Carpenter said in an email to Mississippi Today.
At the same time, the hospital, which drastically cut services and closed its burn center last year, has reduced the hours its MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) is available to patients. Patients will not be able to have an MRI at the weekend or after 4pm and before 7am during the week.
“MRI imaging at Merit Health Central is for diagnostic or planning services. For emergency diagnosis of a head or brain injury, we have CT scans available 24/7,” Carpenter said. “For non-urgent situations after 4pm, we schedule the patient’s MRI for the next available day.”
Nashville-based Community Health Partners owns Merit Health Central and eight other private hospitals in the state. The company has a lease with Hinds County that states Central must operate as a “full-service acute care general hospital.” It is also required to provide medical services to inmates at the Hinds County Detention Center.
County officials were concerned about the hospital’s enforcement of the leases, but Tony Gaylor, attorney for the Hinds County Board of Supervisors, said he and other county officials met with Merit Health officials about three months ago.
He said they were still seeing a “significant number of citizens in their facility.”
“We are certainly concerned about any reduction in services at the hospital. But we’re also mindful of the fact that state laws allow them to sometimes do some level of diversion of patients to other facilities,” Gaylor said.
“We will be talking more with our state officials about what they can do to help us make sure the hospital remains viable for this area of Hinds County,” he said.
Merit Health Central incurred just $16 million in net uninsured costs, or the cost of services for which the patient did not have insurance coverage, in fiscal 2022. That was the most uncompensated care of any Merit Health hospital in the state that year .
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