CASPER, Wyo. \u2014 Natrona County commissioners pressed Banner Wyoming Medical Center leadership Tuesday over patient safety and campus renovations after an independent assessment of the hospital\u2019s 2020 acquisition agreement.<\/p>\n
The presentation<\/a> by healthcare consulting firm PYA, commissioned by the Natrona Collective Health Trust to monitor the hospital\u2019s post-sale obligations, showed the hospital fully met 13 of its 17 contractual covenants for the 2025 calendar year. Three covenants related to the Wyoming Advisory Board\u2019s community engagement were deemed only \u201cpartially met,\u201d a repeat of the previous year\u2019s findings<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n The final covenant regarding capital expenditure was marked as not applicable for this review cycle, though PYA noted the hospital is currently on track to meet its requirement of disbursing $60 million by the end of 2026.<\/p>\n While consultants saw improvements in how information is shared with the advisory board, they said the panel still falls short of its mandate to actively gather and use community input to help shape the medical center\u2019s strategic planning and services.\u00a0<\/p>\n Margo Karsten, Banner\u2019s Western Division president, acknowledged the ongoing gap and told commissioners the hospital is working on an action plan to address the issue.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe did make progress, but it wasn\u2019t good enough,\u201d Karsten said. \u201cWe did work the action plan, and it\u2019s clear that we need to do a better job on engaging the community, so we\u2019re going to take that forward again.\u201d<\/p>\n Commissioner Dallas Laird pressed the consultants and hospital leadership on the overall quality of care, recounting stories of constituents who suffered severe complications, including a patient who required an amputation after a surgery. Pleading for better treatment of local residents, Laird said he was born and raised in the county and doesn\u2019t want his people hurt.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cLook at me. Look at my face,\u201d Laird said. \u201cI\u2019m concerned about these people. And I do talk to them, and I hear them, and they\u2019re frightened.\u201d<\/p>\n Other Natrona County Board of Commissioners Coverage<\/p>\n Dr. Phil Stahel, chief medical officer at Banner Wyoming Medical Center, mentioned the hospital\u2019s recent national recognition as a top 100 community hospital and emphasized his personal commitment to patient safety.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cEvery time I receive a grievance, something goes wrong, the patient suffers harm or they\u2019re unhappy with the care received, even in absence of any wrongdoing or harm, I invite them to my office, listen to their story and I stay in touch with them,\u201d Stahel said. \u201cI\u2019m very sorry, I\u2019m not familiar with your constituents who have suffered, and I\u2019m more than happy to reach out to them.\u201d<\/p>\n He said that as a trauma surgeon of over 30 years, he understands bad outcomes sometimes happen despite the quality of care, but he agreed with Laird\u2019s call for compassion. He told the board he feels that if healthcare workers do not treat every patient and family member on their watch as if they were their own loved ones, they\u2019re hypocrites.<\/p>\n Beyond patient care, commissioners also questioned the physical state of the aging hospital and how the promised capital investments are being used. Interim CEO and Chief Operating Officer Rachel Bryant detailed ongoing renovations to modernize the campus. She reported that the hospital is updating its central utility plant, renovating the oldest, 76-year-old building on campus, replacing flooring room-by-room, and actively working to expand the intensive care unit from 14 to 20 beds.\u00a0<\/p>\n The projects are part of the broader capital investments that Banner is allocating funds toward as the $60 million expenditure deadline approaches.<\/p>\n \n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CASPER, Wyo. \u2014 Natrona County commissioners pressed Banner Wyoming Medical Center leadership Tuesday over patient safety and campus…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":710456,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[97,252,253],"class_list":["post-710455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/710455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=710455"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/710455\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/710456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=710455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=710455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=710455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}