St Vincents Hospital

For 5 years I would religiously stand at an underground platform, board the E or F trains, and take a 45 minute ride to West 4th Street. Marching with the others in unison towards the exit that would take us up the stairs towards the light of day, I would always brace myself for the moment I would feel the fresh air back on my face. Coming out of that train station for me meant walking into a world I loved exploring. For anyone who ever felt like a misfit, lost in the clouds in left field or on another playing field all together, the Village feels like home. So I was at home.........

There are staples in any neighborhood. The Village is no exception. When it was my playground, back in the mid 80's to early 90's, the park was a gathering place for everything from lunch al fresco, struggling musicians, planned protests, planned celebrations....it was a place where mothers took thier children to play, students congregated, professionals took a breather, and of course drug dealers made discreet or not so discreet transactions. People slept there. The mentally ill sought solice there. Soon enough, by the end of my daily journey through those streets, many elderly, many newly homeless families would congregate waiting for St. Grace to open thier food kitchen there.

Another important staple to the community is St. Vincent's hospital. I first came to learn of them my first year at NYU. There was an emergency in a classroom, the paramedics were called and the student was sent to St. Vincents. The student, who had suffered a seizure, was foriegn and did not have insurance. There was a worry that the student would be stablized and then discharged immediately, without much concern over what could happen to her. When she returned to class weeks later she revealed that it was a grand mal seizure and after extensive testing had been put on medication she would need for the rest of her life. Four years later, she graduated with me.

Now, St. Vincent faces the possibility of closure............

Just like this young student was treated years ago, so many insured and uninsured, needy and not so needy have been treated there. Location, location, location, prime necessity for immediate care in a city where closing one hospital easily overburdens the 4 or 5 surrounding ones. This hospital is a haven for it's community. Facing a $700 million dollar debt, and a possible takeover by Continuum Health Services (which operates St.Lukes, Beth Isreal and Roosevelt Hospitals )
the hospital faces a moral dilemma, a takeover that could save it, but at a great disservice to hospital care. They would close all acute care units including inpatient care and surgeries, and would scale back emergency and trauma. They would provide ambulatory services leaving it really as an outpatient facility.
Residents of the west side would be left without a hospital close enough to handle thier emergencies.
I remember St.Vincents Hospital being in the forefront of AIDS care back in the early days of this tragic epidemic. Many of my friends turned to this particular hospital during the mid 80's because of thier reputation. St. Vincents is steeped in history, it is the heartbeat of it's economically diverse community that would otherwise be disgarded.

The revelant irony is that this institution of over 100 years, that has helped the poor, would be left bankrupt.

Here's the question, why is AIG to big to let fail, but a hospital like St. Vincents not important enough to save? Wouldn't Universal Health Care help hospitals like this? Wouldn't a health care plan with public options be able to revitalize our financially strapped hospitals? If our government can step in and save financial institutions for fear that thier demise would futher throw us all into a recession we would not be able to recover from, couldn't they pass a health care bill that would help save our hospitals, and in turn save our lives? Aren't we a precious commodity as well? Aren't we worth investing in? Isn't the health of our communities important too?

It's been a long time since I've been on that train ride, climbed into that world, or sat in the park.
It's been a long time since I've been to St. Vincents, or served lunch at St. Graces......but I don't have to be a constant presence to know just what St. Vincents means, or what it feels like to walk with your thoughts while accompanied by the embedded creativity of a neighborhood layered in culture, art, humor, compassion and awareness.......
it feels like home.............