Brownwood Regional Medical Center is privileged to serve the health care needs of Brown County and surrounding areas. In our hospital, more than 550 employees work around the clock, 365 days a year to provide residents with quality health care when they need it. Hospitals are not like schools, where grandparents, parents and children are engaged almost every day. You probably don’t think about our local hospitals most days. But, if an illness or injury occurs, you expect us to be here to heal you and your loved ones with compassion and skill.
Despite everyone’s best efforts, some illnesses or injuries can’t be healed. And it’s the same way with the budget cuts proposed in Austin. If funding for local hospitals, doctors and nurses is not maintained, our health care system will be hurt beyond repair and people all across Texas will feel the consequences.
With cuts of 35 percent or more in state reimbursement for care, some hospitals will be forced to limit services. Some clinics will close. Wait times will grow longer for everyone. Unemployment will increase and it will cause an economic ripple effect through our community, touching local businesses from whom our hospitals and employees buy goods and services.
State budget cuts in health care also will cause Texas to lose billions of federal matching dollars for health care. This loss will result in a shift of costs to someone, local government, private insurance, someone. Why would we leave federal dollars on the table, taxes paid by Texans, to support health care in other states like New York or California?
You and your family and friends probably take health care for granted. If you have a health care crisis, you count on calling 9-1-1 and an ambulance coming and taking you to the hospital ER. In addition to cutting reimbursement to doctors and hospitals, lawmakers are reducing funding for the trauma care system, which is supported in large part by the Driver Responsibility Program that penalizes bad drivers with increased fines. Since the program’s inception, legislators have appropriated only part of the money raised for its original purpose: supporting trauma care. Now, they are proposing to allocate even less or about $58 million per year for the next two-year budget – a 23 percent decrease from 2010-11. And some lawmakers want to eliminate the Driver Responsibility Program, leaving the state’s trauma system with no financial support. At a time when the state is considering cutting funding for doctors and mental health providers, which will drive more patients to seek help from emergency rooms, now is not the time to reduce trauma care spending, or leave the trauma system without a source of financial support.
We know we need a balanced state budget, but please join us in asking our legislators to consider the consequences of deep cuts in health care funding. Visit the Texas Hospital Association’s website, www.somecutsdontheal.com, and help protect patients and the hospitals, doctors and nurses who care for them.
To show your support, help us by contacting our state legislators today and urge them to make decisions that are right for Texas! Our hospital wants to be here when you need us. Help us so we can be here for you. We thank you for your support!!
Contact information for state legislators:
Representative James L. “Jim” Keffer
Room 1N.12, Capitol Extension
P.O. Box 2910
Austin, TX 78768
(512) 463-0656
(512) 478-8805 Fax
District Address:
P.O. Box 857 Eastland, TX 76448 (800
