Health providers say ‘silly’ rule led to Prairieville facility’s closure

BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) - The privately-run Prairieville Family Hospital was forced to close over the weekend after five years in business. The Louisiana Department of Health notified the owners that the hospital has not met the state’s criteria to operate as a hospital.

Health Secretary Ralph Abraham sent notice to the owners that they would need to close before Monday, April 29.

The facility stood near a strip mall on Market Place Drive. Around 70 people worked at the facility which served as both a hospital with nearly a dozen inpatient beds and an emergency room with five beds.

Secretary Abraham wrote that the facility was out of compliance with state rules for inpatient hospitals that dictate the amount of time a patient should stay under care. According to the letter, the facility failed to meet the minimum requirements for what the average patient’s length of stay should be.

Abraham wrote that because the license for the hospital operation was in jeopardy, the facility would also need to stop operating as an emergency center.

State rules require that emergency facilities operate under the purview of a larger hospital system or be located on a larger hospital’s grounds, according to the letter.

Longtime employee Dr. Jodi McGee called the state’s rules silly. He said LDH had given healthcare providers at Prairieville Family Hospital the chance to increase the length of stay for their patients over several months and were working on coming into compliance with the state’s rules when LDH snatched the license suddenly.

“I think it’s a silly rule. I don’t think it’s relevant to providing good healthcare,” said McGee.

“There’s is no downside to us being open,” he added.

McGee explained that the facility was crucial to helping larger hospitals offload COVID-19 patients during the height of the pandemic.

Dr. Stewart Cayton echoed McGee’s statements. Cayton said the hospital was a medical resource for local patients. He says the community will suffer because of arbitrary rules.

“To be penalized because people aren’t staying for two days doesn’t make sense,” said Cayton.

“To me this is akin to looking at a small business and going ‘hey you’re not growing fast enough so we’re going to take your license. Good luck feeding your family,’” Cayton added.

A spokeswoman for LDH provided a statement to WAFB along with a copy of the letter from Abraham.

“LDH has issued a license revocation notice to Prairieville Family Hospital, located at 37358 Market Place Drive, Prairieville, Louisiana. LDH has determined that Prairieville Family Hospital is operating as a freestanding emergency department in violation of La. R.S. 40: §2115.33,” the statement reads.

Cayton says that he hopes that LDH will review these rules and possibly consider changing them. He says they unfairly target small facilities and smaller communities like Prairieville.

“It does not make sense why they would do this to the people of this area,” said Cayton.

“Taking this facility away is only going to be a detriment to this community,” he added.

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