Manitowoc and nursing

farmerRN · Aug 3, 2007

Hi there,

Are you still looking for information on the hospitals on the lakeshore...I can fill you in!

1studentnurse · Aug 4, 2007

Yes! My husband interviewed for a job there this week.

His friend seems to think he's going to get it -- he started taking him house-shopping before he left.

I'd appreciate any info you'd be willing to share.

farmerRN · Aug 10, 2007

There are only the 2 hospitals on the Lakeshore. There is Holy Family Memorial Hospital. The past year has not been good for them. They had to close several units and combine others. There has been alot of change and From what I hear...and a few former employees...moral is not that great and pay freeze is currently going on.

The other hospital is Aurora Medical Center in Two Rivers. The hospital itself is only 7 years old...up to date equipment...people are nice. You have the perk of working for Aurora Healthcare...lots of opporunity to transfer through out the system. As bad as press they get sometimes...they aren't that bad to work for.

Both hospitals are your typical small town community hospitals. The real sick patients, true cardiacs, traumas, and burns are transferred to either Green Bay or Milwaukee. You deal with alot of small town mentality and there are alot of under educated folks in the area! Just my observations!!!!

robred · Oct 12, 2007

As a current employee of one of the two hospitals mentioned and a former employee of the other, I feel I'm in a unique position to offer an opinion to your questions.

I worked for Aurora for eight years to include while it was based at the former facility as well as the new. Eight months after moving to the new hospital, I resigned when concerns for the welfare fo a manager went unheeded. Shortly after my departure, the manager left, too.

The new facility is a beautiful building located on the Lake Michigan shoreline and has new equipment and nice people. In fact, many of those I worked with are there today and I'll always treasure the working relationships I had with them. As farmerRN commented, the Aurora hospital is part of an immense network that includes more than a dozen hospitals (and still building) in South and Northeastern

Wisconsin and more than 100 clinics over the same geographical area. I've read news reports that SE Wi (where the majority of the clinics and inpt facilities are located) has the highest cost per capita for healthcare in the Midwest. I don't know if such as undertaking plays a role, but I have to wonder.

I've worked at Holy Family Memorial (HFM) for the past six years (three FT and the inital three as a casual). While trying to remain competitive in an ever changing health care environment, it closed its psych unit and combined the med/surg unit to streamline services 10 months ago. There were layoffs, but the majority of those nurses moved into other positions or were rehired after the dust settled. It also did some building of its own to improve the appearance of an aging structure to make it more appealing. Finally, it's come to my attetnion from patients who are receiving state funded medical assistance that the competitor has elected not to provide them with primary or inpt care, especially for pre, peri, and postnatal mothers. Consequently, there's been a considerable increase in the OB unit census of those who receive medical assistance. I wonder what effect this has on reimbursements in an expensive, high risk area?

Nonetheless, despite the enormous fiscal challenges, HFM continues its more than 100 year long tradition of providing services to the population while keeping patient safety and employee satisfaction out front. For example, it recently gave the nurses a 4% pay hike, continues to grow in a number of services including cardiac cath lab, oncology care and specialized orthopedic spinal surgery while implementing EtCO2 monitoring for pts with epidural and PCA pain mgt, e-mar med

administration and a rapid resonse team process.

I don't necessarily agree that the area has 'alot of undereducated folks'. We are, however, an aging area of the state. Pateints requiring cardiac surgery, neurosurg, high risk peri-natal, burn and/or inpt pulmonolgy are transferred to tertiary centers in GB or Milwaukee.

Lastly, thanks for the blog...it's the first I've read by a rehab RN. Good Luck!

Liz Dexia · Feb 9, 2008

There are only the 2 hospitals on the Lakeshore. There is Holy Family Memorial Hospital. The past year has not been good for them. They had to close several units and combine others. There has been alot of change and From what I hear...and a few former employees...moral is not that great and pay freeze is currently going on.

I work at HFMMC and couldn't agree with you more. Morale is horrible there. I've only been there 4 months and can't wait to find a job somewhere else. It was the biggest mistake coming here. With the pay freeze, reduction of benefits, and their cheap attitude... no wonder RN's are leaving.