Five years

The news late last month that labor and delivery services at Sharon Hospital will be maintained for a period of five years was welcomed by our community. Connecticut Attorney General Willam Tong said it well: “Miles and minutes matter when it comes to labor and delivery, and I am pleased that Northwell has committed to preserving affordable, lifesaving care—especially maternity care—for Western Connecticut. This is a strong, enforceable agreement for healthcare access in Connecticut.”

Nuvance Health announced this spring that it planned to combine with Northwell Health, the largest health provider in New York State. The resulting 28-hospital system would span the New York and Connecticut border. Northwell itself employs 85,000 people, making it the largest private employer in New York state.

The reprieve was the latest chapter in the battle to keep labor and delivery services at Sharon Hospital, a struggle that has been waged by the grassroots organization Save Sharon Hospital and others, including our political leaders, for years. This year in February the state of Connecticut denied the hospital’s request to close the services, citing a long list of “Findings of Fact” that the hospital questioned. The hospital petitioned the state to reconsider, but the state denied that appeal.

At the time of the announcement of the new combination with Northwell, Sharon Hospital CEO Christine McCulloch said that Northwell has agreed to invest in all of the Nuvance hospitals. So it’s not a complete surprise that labor and delivery services at Sharon Hospital have been spared the chopping block — at least for now.

Save Sharon Hospital described the development as a great first step.

Our hospital had its humble beginnings in 1909 in a house rented by Dr. Jerome Chaffee. Less than a decade later a new building opened with 16 beds and three nurses. Over the years, the hospital underwent more expansion. In a 1969 Lakeville Journal article commemorating Sharon Hospital’s 60th anniversary, its history was described as “written by thousands of dedicated people who founded it, planned its development, staffed its facilities, financed expansion programs and, in many cases, became thankful patients.”

Ownership changes first started to occur in 2002 when a for-profit named Essent Healthcare of Tennessee bought the nonprofit, which triggered protests. More than a decade later Essent merged with another Tennessee-based group, RegionalCare Hospital Partners. Some five years after that, in 2016, Health Quest, formed by a merger of three hospitals in New York, took control of the hospital and it once again became a nonprofit. Soon thereafter, in 2019, Health Quest merged with Western CT Health Network, with hospitals in Connecticut, to become Nuvance Health.

This whirlwind of merger and acquisition and flip flop from nonprofit to for-profit and back to nonprofit brings us to our current state of affairs. Confidence in the future prospects for our beloved rural hospital should be bolstered by both Sharon Hospital’s ranking and by Northwell’s long list of top honors as a healthcare provider, and by the reputation of its CEO Michael Dowling as a healthcare leader. Last week, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) gave Sharon Hospital a five-star rating for the fifth consecutive year.

As SSH said, this is a great first step, and welcome news.

Latest News

All are welcome at The Mahaiwe

Paquito D’Rivera performs at the Mahaiwe in Great Barrington on April 5.

Geandy Pavon

Natalia Bernal is the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center’s education and community engagement manager and is, in her own words, “the one who makes sure that Mahaiwe events are accessible to all.”

The Mahaiwe’s community engagement program is rooted in the belief that the performing arts should be for everyone. “We are committed to establishing and growing partnerships with neighboring community and arts organizations to develop pathways for overcoming social and practical barriers,” Bernal explained. “Immigrants, people of color, communities with low income, those who have traditionally been underserved in the performing arts, should feel welcomed at the Mahaiwe.”

Keep ReadingShow less
Living with the things you love:
a conversation with Mary Randolph Carter
Mary Randolph Carter teaches us to surround ourselves with what matters to live happily ever after.
Carter Berg

There is magic in a home filled with the things we love, and Mary Randolph Carter, affectionately known as “Carter,” has spent a lifetime embracing that magic. Her latest book, “Live with the Things You Love … and You’ll Live Happily Ever After,” is about storytelling, joy, and honoring life’s poetry through the objects we keep.

“This is my tenth book,” Carter said. “At the root of each is my love of collecting, the thrill of the hunt, and living surrounded by things that conjure up family, friends, and memories.”

Keep ReadingShow less
Beloved classic film ‘The Red Shoes’ comes to the big screen for Triplex benefit
Provided

On Saturday, April 5, at 3 p.m., The Triplex Cinema in Great Barrington and Jacob’s Pillow, the dance festival in Becket, Massachusetts, are presenting a special benefit screening of the cinematic masterpiece, “The Red Shoes,” followed by a discussion and Q&A. Featuring guest speakers Norton Owen, director of preservation at Jacob’s Pillow, and dance historian Lynn Garafola, the event is a fundraiser for The Triplex.

“We’re pitching in, as it were, because we like to help our neighbors,” said Norton. “They (The Triplex) approached us with the idea, wanting some input if they were going to do a dance film. I thought of Lynn as the perfect person also to include in this because of her knowledge of The Ballets Russes and the book that she wrote about Diaghilev. There is so much in this film, even though it’s fictional, that derives from the Ballets Russes.” Garafola, the leading expert on the Ballets Russes under Serge Diaghilev, 1909–1929, the most influential company in twentieth-century theatrical dance, said, “We see glimpses of that Russian émigré tradition, performances we don’t see much of today. The film captures the artifice of ballet, from the behind-the-scenes world of dressers and conductors to the sheer passion of the audience.”

Keep ReadingShow less