Danville Regional Medical Center (DRMC) in Danville, Virginia serves the cities of Martinsville and Danville, along with most of Southside Virginia. This once proud and accomplished hospital has a total of 350 staffed beds and gross revenue in excess of $375 Million Dollars. A couple of years ago the hospital was purchased by LifePoint Hospitals, Inc. and that is when the problems started.
DRMC, once a community based hospital is now run by a multi-state corporate medical empire (50 hospitals in 19 states) based in Tennessee. LifePoint, most likely run by MBA’s and accountants, quickly reduced the staff to increase profit and patient care suffered as a result. Last week, the hospital announced that it had received a “preliminary denial of accreditation” from the Joint Commission, a national health care accreditation organization. Sounds like trouble to me!