Decatur County General closes its doors, joins list of closed rural hospitals
PARSONS, Tenn.–Haywood Park Community Hospital, McKenzie Regional Hospital, and McNairy Regional Hospital, just to name a few, all have one thing in common….They’re closed.
After 56 years, another rural west Tennessee hospital joins that list.
“That hospital captured every emotion the human body could exhibit, from fear, from birth to death,” Decatur County Mayor Mike Creasy said.
Mayor Creasy said at 12:01 a.m. on April 15, Decatur County General Hospital officially closed its doors to patients.
“We fought a good fight with it. We tried, we attempted, and a lot of people support the hospital. Of course, you have your naysayers out there on everything,” Creasy said.
He said a few reasons led to the unfortunate closure of the hospital.
“The rural healthcare system in the United States as a whole, Medicaid expansion was part of it but not all of it, the cost of doing business in healthcare is just so expensive and everything has to hit just perfectly,” Creasy said.
He adds that along with the lack of reimbursements from private and government funded insurance.
Decatur County EMA director Andrew Sparks says this closure changes emergency response protocol.
“Our plan would be to transport the patients from Decatur County to the closest hospital we have available, which would be Lexington,” Sparks said, “if they were severe, we’d go to Jackson, Dickson, or Nashville.”
Other nearby hospitals include Hardin Medical Center in Savannah, Camden General Hospital in Benton County, and Perry Community Hospital in Linden.
“When that emergency arises, we hope they have those extra few minutes they can actually make it to another facility,” Creasy said.
Creasy said even though Decatur County General may have been limited in certain services it still saved lives.
“I know people walking around today, still living, because of that hospital,” Creasy said.
The county still has EMS, Air Evac, local healthcare clinics, and urgent care as medial options.
