Rather than news, the recent front page piece on Nov. 30, “Hospital satellite’s expansion comes with LGTBQ focus,” seemed like free advertising for a new Cooley Dickinson Hospital practice.
Instead of giving an accurate portrayal of our current health-care system, the reporting furthered anachronistic notions of how health care is delivered and who is providing care.
From the beginning of the piece, why didn’t the article more honestly and accurately report that a team of clinicians, physicians and nurse practitioners would provide care? Instead, we were informed that a “team of physicians” would make up the new practice. In addition, other clinicians in the Pioneer Valley, including the family nurse practitioner mentioned late in the article and employed by Oxbow Family Practice, are already providing care for LGTBQ individuals, even during pregnancy.
At a time of a vast shortage of doctors who will do primary care, isn’t it time that the press not fail to include nurse practitioners, nurse midwives and physician assistants when it writes about who is providing our care?
I hope that the Gazette will do a more accurate story about health care in the Hilltowns. I was curious how these residents, being courted by CDH, would even get to Atwood Drive and whether the hospital is trying to reinvent the wheel.
For almost 70 years, these more rural and isolated communities have received care from federally funded community health centers. These not-for-profit clinics provide medical, dental, eye and behavioral health care to all, regardless of their ability to pay. They have a mission to care for these communities, and cannot match CDH’s public relations and advertising budgets.
When do these clinics get the press and free advertising that they deserve from our local press?
Anne Fine
Northampton