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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 22, 1983)
Page 12/The Battalion/Wednesday, June 22,1983 Economics of obstetrics now a matter of location United Press International Urban flight and low birth rates have forced manv inner- city hospitals to close obstetrics wards, but a “mini baby boom” is sparking a comeback in the busi ness of births in suburbia. Hospital planners and admi nistrators say delivering babies has never been a big revenue producer for their institutions. High-tech diagnostic services and surgery are the real money makers. But in the last few years, obstetrics has turned from a los er to a profitmaker for some hospitals. Location, they say, appears to be the key. Middle-class flight from in ner cities apparently has caused a radical shift in the birth busi ness to suburban areas, where couples of child-bearing age and financial resources have relo cated. “It has been a trend in most major cities,” said Robert Wright, vice president of plan ning for Mercy Health Center, a non-profit hospital which moved from the inner city to the suburbs in 1975. “We built out where the population was projected to come,” he said. “Now we’re reaping the benefits.” While the birth rate at Mercy has been soaring for the past three years, plummeting obstet rics business at St. Anthony Hos pital, a non-profit hospital in the inner city, has caused adminis trators to eliminate the entire obstetrics ward. “The number of births has been declining every year for the last seven years,” said St. Anthony administrator J. Michael Stephans, who came to Oklahoma City from a St. Louis inner-city hospital also forced to close its obstetrics ward. Because of all the support facilities that have to be main tained to operate obstetrics MEETING: RUDDER TOWER WED. JUNE 22 7:30 PM TEXAS A&M SPORTS CAR CLUB wards, a sharp drop in the birth rate can be a heavy financial blow, Stephans said. “Below a certain point, you don’t come close to covering the cost,” he said. The slowed economy also has forced more couples to rely on state hospitals for birth services, said Dr. John Fishburne, chair man of obstetrics and gynecolo gy at state-funded Oklahoma Memorial Hospital. He said more than 4,000 babies a year are being delivered in facilities built to handle 2,500 as the recession has made it im possible for many couples to afford a private obstetrician. Jerry Evans, director of plan ning for Baptist Medical Center, a non-profit, privately owned facility on the city’s growing northwest side, said most hospit als constructed during the 1950s and early 1960s included obstet rics wards designed for birth volumes of the post-World War II baby boom. When births de clined in the 1970s, those hospit als which could keep an adequ ate volume did okay, those which could not suffered sub stantial losses, he said. However, the original “baby felayed boom” kids who put off having children through their early 20s now are having children of their own, helping the birth business make a comeback. “There is a mini baby boom in about its third year now,” Evans said. “We’re catching up with the births that were' de through the 1970s.” The baby business is “com petitive” and more “price re sponsive,” making it unique among most hospital services, Evans said. “You’re talking ab out young people who will typic ally shop around k bit.” He has joined other hospitals in providing facilities for the growing number of couples who prefer natural childbirth, which costs one-third to one-fourth of the $2,000 to $4,000 a tradition al birth can run. Brandy Mills, vice president of financial affairs for the Oklahoma Hos pital Association, said while ob stetrics and emergency rooms traditionally are “notorious los ers,” as long as birth rate is climbing, the baby business can be more of a profitable venture. “It’s really a volume busi ness,” he said. Match Stick Blinds $C99 2 ft. width with other sizes available Small Wicker Table *11 88 Carroll’s Baskets & Wicker Next to Sears in Post Oak Matt 76^07^^mericar^xpress^Visa^aster^ar^^ccepted Uni •WASH I! udget lea< Hte to ai Hiise fc ■week, Han to Cobweb cleaning staters new Jim Dillinger, a senior mechanical engineering major from DeKalb, cleans cobwebs in the hard-to-reach of the Sterling C. 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