Westbank Louisiana News

Last week, West Monroe Mayor Staci Albritton Mitchell and Louisiana Representative Michael Charles Echols appeared before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee to discuss Steward Health Care’s financial mismanagement of Glenwood Regional Medical Center in West Monroe, LA.

In the hearing, Mitchell and Echols testified that under Steward’s leadership, Glenwood has lacked essential supplies for patient care, leading to serious harm to patients and even death. They also discussed how patients have been transferred or turned away from Glenwood, overwhelming other regional hospitals forced to take on the burden. Mitchell and Echols detailed the negative impacts of Steward’s financial mismanagement on the northeast Louisiana economy, including 450 lost jobs at Glenwood.

“We know that good health care is a must for a region to prosper. And Steward's management has had a negative effect on our efforts to attract business, residents, and industry,” said Mayor Mitchell. “It is imperative that when individuals or companies invest in critical infrastructure, such as health care, that they do so in a responsible manner, and they have their patients and the well-being of all in mind. And in Steward’s case, there was a failure to uphold this responsibility.”

"Today is a very important step in holding those accountable in this health care delivery system that continue to rob from us all across America,” said Representative Echols. “Glenwood, its employees, and the people on the ground are terrific people. They’ve done everything in their power to make sure that the patients get everything they can but their hands have been just completely tied.”

After the hearing, U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy (R-LA), ranking member of the Senate HELP Committee announced that the HELP Committee will consider resolutions this week to hold Steward Health CEO Dr. Ralph de la Torre in contempt for defying a congressional subpoena to testify before the Committee. In July, the HELP Committee voted on a strong bipartisan basis to subpoena Dr. de la Torre’s testimony after his repeated refusal to cooperate with the Committee’s investigation into Steward’s financial mismanagement of its hospitals.