Moss Regional cuts to affect wait times for patients

The $11 million in cuts W.O. Moss Regional faces will likely result in longer waits, but outpatient and inpatient services

will continue, said the hospital’s interim administrator.

In order for the hospital, part of the LSU Health Care System, to absorb cuts and stay within its budget, Jimmy Pottorff said,

it will scale back inpatient beds to 10 and reduce its payroll.

Pottorff said the hospital will also absorb cuts by not going through with some expansion projects that were included in the

budget for the newly begun fiscal year.

The governor announced plans to strip $329 million from the LSU Health Care System late last month — with Moss Regional and

a hospital in Tangipahoa Parish facing the deepest cuts.

Of its $11,134,464 in cuts, Moss Regional had more than $5 million stripped from inpatient services and $1.9 million from

clinical operations.

“We have cleared this hurdle, but the race is far from over,” Pottorff said in a news release. “We are still facing a projected

budget shortfall later in this year, and that shortfall will fast be approaching.”

Southwest Louisiana lawmakers met with LSU officials last Wednesday to discuss plans to deal with the cuts. Rep. A.B. Franklin,

D-Lake Charles, told the American Press that the cuts were “unfair” and that the hospital has “absorbed more cuts each year than other state-run hospitals.”

Rep. Mike Danahay, D-Sulphur, said he “has concerns about handling cuts over the long term.”