PORT TOWNSEND — Providing affordable treatment is the most important issue facing Jefferson Healthcare, said candidates for the hospital’s commission.
“Many people struggle with the cost of health care,” said Paul Stafford, who is challenging incumbent Mari Dressler for the Position 4 seat on the Nov. 3 ballot.
“People choose to not receive the cost, or people who do get care find themselves being taken to collections,” Stafford said.
Stafford, Dressler and Position 2 candidates Kees Kolff and Chuck Russell appeared Monday before about 80 people in a forum sponsored by the Jefferson County Chamber of Commerce at the Port Townsend Elks Club. Port Townsend/Jefferson County Leader Publisher Scott Wilson moderated the 40-minute forum.
The nonpartisan positions on the five-member commission are for six-year terms.
Dressler and Russell are incumbent commissioners with Dressler seeking a second term and Russell a fourth.
Ballots will be mailed Oct. 14 for the general election.
Stafford, 48, said that it was important for the hospital to be in good financial shape which allows it to provide a greater amount of charity care.
Kolff, a fellow challenger of an incumbent, agreed.
“We need to have a financially strong institution in order to have affordable health care,” Kolff said.
“We need to get affordable health care programs in this county by developing a comprehensive, broad based community health care that involves many partners.”
Incumbent Russell, 73, also linked financial health to the ability to provide needed services.
“It’s very important that we maintain a good business ethic and think about the finances of the hospital, which is owned by this community,” Russell said.
“We need to make sure that we don’t go under like a lot of small hospitals in this state.”
Fellow incumbent Dressler, 69, stressed the importance of affordable care.
“We have a degree of people who don’t have the ability to seek care or feel they don’t,” Dressler said.
“Access to care is one of the most important things aside from mental health care.”
Stafford criticized the hospital’s use of Epic, an electronic records management system that was installed in 2013 under a 10-year contract.
“I have talked to a lot of providers who say Epic is a fantastic system but the problem is we don’t have our own local implementation,” Stafford said.
“All of these records are being hosted and we have no local control,” he said.
“I want to make sure we have local control over our medical records in the long term.”
Dressler said the Epic system is implemented through a partnership with Providence Health and Services and was the reason that Jefferson Healthcare sought out that alliance.
She said that while the data is not hosted locally it is still under the hospital’s control.
“It is a little bit uncomfortable to not have medical records on our doorstep but with the infrastructure we have, it’s quite difficult to maintain everything in our county,” she said.
“I’m quite happy with Epic at the moment.”
Russell said the hospital couldn’t have purchased Epic on its own due to its small size.
“We didn’t buy Epic on our own. They wouldn’t sell to us,” he said.
“We had to seek out a larger entity to partner with because we are such small potatoes.”
Kolff said that when the contract is up in 2023, the hospital should consider alternatives to renewal.
“When the contract is over, I’m unsure who will own the content of those records,” he said.
“My main concern was how Epic was implemented, because that happened in a way that put a tremendous amount of stress on the staff.”
Kolff said that implementing new programs can be done in such a way that the staff can continue to provide quality care during the transition.
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Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or cbermant@peninsuladailynews.com.
