PORT ANGELES — The public can have its say Saturday on what role Olympic Medical Center should play in the impending sale of Virginia Mason Medical Center’s clinic at 433 E. Eighth St.
The hearing will begin at 3 p.m. in the Wendel Room and Linkletter Hall in the basement of the hospital, 939 Caroline St.
Olympic Medical Center bills the session as “a community discussion regarding the role of Olympic Medical Center in supporting primary care.”
The only primary-care question, though, is what will happen to Virginia Mason’s nine family practitioners when the Seattle-based health care provider closes the clinic.
Since Sept. 28, when Virginia Mason announced its intention to sell the clinic, its patients have wondered where they will find their family doctors.
Olympic Medical Center could buy the clinic outright, or it could buy all or some of the practices, taking them into its doctors’ services division known as Olympic Medical Physicians.
The first option is unlikely, according to Commissioner Arlene Engel, who cited the hospital’s burden of bad debt and charity care, plus its ambitious construction program.
The second alternative is feared by solo and small-clinic practitioners who worry about competition with a large, subsidized group of family doctors.
Olympic Medical Center also could do nothing, which is also improbable, according to hospital Commissioner Harlan Knudson.
