PORT ANGELES — Olympic Medical Center’s plan to keep Virginia Mason Clinic doctors in practice and in town seemed to sour Tuesday.
While a long-term solution to the clinic’s closure is in sight, no short-term answer is apparent, Port Angeles hospital officials and clinic doctors agreed.
For the first time since Olympic Medical Center CEO Mike Glenn announced a plan to support the doctors last December, the threat emerged that those doctors might have to quit their practices or leave town when the clinic closes April 30.
“It’s all too possible that the clinic could close,” said Dr. Paul Pederson, speaking for the clinic physicians.
“It would be naive to think it would not get to that.”
Virginia Mason blamed
Pederson blamed the clinic’s parent, Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle, for the impasse.
“The key reason has been Virginia Mason’s refusal to provide anywhere near adequate financial support to fund a successful transition,” he said.
Virginia Mason-Seattle first announced in September that it would close the clinic this spring, setting off consternation among its 19,000 patients over where they would find primary health care.
Olympic Medical Center’s answer was to keep the family doctors in private practice but sell them the hospital’s support for information technology, payroll, billing and similar services.
Three-way negotiations have continued since December, and Glenn said Tuesday that they would continue despite “very real and difficult” issues that separated the parties.
Virginia Mason-Seattle’s initial reaction to Pederson’s remarks was a spokeswoman’s statement that she knew nothing of the issue.
Medical center commissioners will learn more about the situation at their meeting at 6 p.m. today in Linkletter Hall at the hospital, 939 Caroline St. The session is open to the public.
