AJ News

Mary Ondrako mondrako@scrantonedition.com

Mercy Tyler Hospital in Tunkhannock announced Thursday it will lay off 18 employees as part of a reorganization plan.

The affected employees, full- and part-time from infection control, pharmacy, laboratory, imaging, EKG, and physician services departments, were notified Thursday morning, said Denise Gieski, hospital president and CEO. The layoffs were expected to be completed by the week’s end.

This is the first time in more than 10 years for layoffs at Tyler, Gieski said.

Gieski said the hospital has been dealing with significant financial losses due to decreasing patient volumes and increasing costs to replace and upgrade medical equipment and facilities. “We lost more than $2 million in both 2008 and 2009,” she said.

“We’re a small hospital and a small community. This is a very sad day,” Gieski said. “We did this only as a last resort.”

“We’ve done everything we could to avoid this,” Gieski said, noting additional cost savings are being realized resulting from recent retirements and reassignments of personnel with the Mercy Health Partners system.

The former Tyler Memorial Hospital merged with MHP on Jan. 1.

“The merger with Mercy has enabled Tyler to take advantage economies of scale,” Gieski said. “We’ve seen some nice cost savings. We are looking at everything we do.”

The merger has resulted in savings in pharmaceutical costs and the purchase of surgical prosthetics and other supplies, Gieski said.

MHP president Kevin Cook, in a prepared statement, said, “Everyone (at MHP) is deeply committed to our ministry, and we look forward to being part of this community’s health care solution for many years to come.”

Gieski said the cuts were necessary as the hospital looks to improve patient services and become a “more stable” facility. She noted that costs to remain up-to-date in health care are challenging.

Several projects are planned to meet these challenges, she added, including upgrades to radiology services under way and expansion of the emergency department expected to begin next year.

“This is positioning us to move in to the future in positive ways,” Gieski said. “We’re in a very difficult time. Cuts, even of this nature, are significant and very painful.

“We are not alone,” she added, citing that increasing challenges to deliver and improve patient services to stay competitive is forcing other medical services providers to make changes. In February, Moses Taylor in Scranton laid off 61 employees and Community Medical Center announced Wednesday it will close its NICU in mid-June.