So a certain councilman in the City of Manassas has decided to take on the City Council, single-handedly, and regulate Amethyst Health Center. By whose authority? Mr. Aveni, do you know that abortion is a legal procedure in all 50 states in the United States? Why are you trying to bankrupt the very city that you live in? Manassas should not become a lawsuit magnet.
The owner of the Amethyst Health Center will close the clinic when she is ready to close it, or, she will sell it. You cannot not stand in her way or alter her course. She will topple you like a house of cards while she smiles. The City of Manassas will be sued unless you all regulate all the other outpatient facilities the same way. That would include your plastic surgeons, your gastroenterologists, your oral surgeons, your urologists, and any other medical practice that performs surgery.
Just out of curiosity, why do you people think you are in the position to evaluate what happens between an individual and his or her doctor? Let’s move it past the subject of abortion. Aren’t people entitled to just a little bit of privacy? Don’t people trust their doctors to adhere to best practice? I wouldn’t go to a doctor who didn’t.
Let’s be honest. It’s all political. Mr. Aveni, did you empty out your church to mob the City Council meeting after your resolution failed? Your religious beliefs are not and should not be part of public policy. The believers should practice their faith and leave everyone else alone. You are wasting everyone else’s time and money. Stick to making sure your own house is in order.
This is all a knee-jerk reaction to a situation that has been the status quo for 25 years. Now we hear a Henny-Penny Sky is Falling hysteria over a new abortion clinic coming to town in the next 4 weeks. How absurd! That is simply rumor and hysteria. I also heard you all were getting a nuclear plant. Anyone worried about that? I would be. I bet that’s a rumor also. Why would there be two abortion providers in the same city? There is no new abortion clinic coming to town.
The good people of the City of Manassas need to demand that this nonsense stop so their elected officials can get back to work on the governance of all things City. Right now, you folks are mired down in someone else’s religious beliefs. Time to move on.
One more thing–many folks agree with me but aren’t nearly as outspoken. Think about that at election time. Extreme anti abortion politics really aren’t going to win local elections. You might just have to find that out for yourself though. Don’t you think if most people wanted to get rid of an abortion clinic, it would have happened by now?
@Six Pack
Inspections of Clinics, Hospitals et.al for compliance with State Regulations is generally not posted at VDH website. All those various rules like HIPAA require a level of confidentiality. The City Council can receive them, but they become a limited-release document. About the only public health record you can find at VDH is the Resturant Inspections.
Oliva, I join Moon and Elena in their welcome. Your comments though raise my previous points as to “why the hurry” versus the Staff recommendations approved on Feb. 3rd? Your comments reflect the political nature of the issue versus the “good governance” which a small few like me are asking for. I for one do not see it as an issue of reaching out to the pro-life community.
With regards to “beating a dead horse”, the fact your Father raised it again, and then Mr. Randolph made his substitute to bring it back Monday, well, I see it as not a done deal. The Minutes from Feb. 3rd reflect it was debated, and Mr. Lovejoy cast his vote on the side of good governance. I don’t few that as disappointing the pro-life community; I see that as his waying the options – and seeing no emergency since VDH published the regulations in June 2013 on Abortion Clinics – voted to support the Staff.
@Ray Beverage
I don’t want to bust your bubble Ray but some 82% of hospitals (that’s 92% of hospital beds) seek and have JCAHO accreditation. If I am not mistaken, almost all teaching hospitals are accredited since many medical schools won’t recommend non-accredited hospitals for internships or affiliation with the medical school. It’s more than Medicare and Medicaid.
But why should a clinic have anything to do with hospital beds?
@ Moon, for your edification on the JCAHO (I apologize for leaving off the O), I recommend you go to this site: http://www.jointcommission.org
Who credentials physicians providing abortion services? Credentialing and Licensure are two different issues. Credentialing is a thorough review of a practitioners education, training, sanctions, etc. Licensure is simply an authorization to practice medicine after meeting the standards for graduation and granting the M.D degree. Other health practitioners also require licensure and credentialing.
Who, for example, George. I believe most abortion doctors are licensed in the state and have regular credentials from their schools and other acadamies they have attended.
For a topic that many people feel doesn’t impact their daily lives, i would observe that this post is very popular!
The local abortion clinic inspection reports are available with a FOIA ( Freedom of Information Act) request to the State health department.
I think it’s like Cato says, this thread was like watching a ten car pile up and simply not being able to take your eyes away.
Six pack, Elena and I put up abortion articles all the time and often get very few comments. The fact that this one was a local story added to its ‘popularity.’ The fact that one contributor had a melt down and spoke rudely and disrespectfully to Elena and me added to the interest.
Let’s face it. Abortion doesn’t impact our daily lives. I am a die hard pro choice person with many years behind me as an activist. I am far more interested than the average bear.
I am assuming you are an activist? Tell us a little about yourself. You seem rational and articulate. I would like to hear your story and what motivates your interest in the topic.
Perhaps Mr. Harris will do this???
@George S. Harris
George, your correct it is more than just Medicare and Medicaid. I just live in the world where those Hospitals/Healthcare Centers who are required as part of their State approval to operate to provide indigent care have to have Joint Commission accreditation. Been that way since 1965 when President Johnson signed the Medicare and Medicaid bills.
The Joint Commission though is fast becoming not the only accreditiation body in the US. Sentara Healthcare has shifted to DNV Healthcare as it is more person-centered than the view JC is penalty. Speciality clinics (such as Rehab) and Long-Term Care facilities are also having other accreditation organizations now.
@Moon-howler
A quick way to look at why clinics: think of them as entry points to hospitals. People who go to Prince William Free Clinic get checked, and the doctors find a condition best treated in a hospital. Same would be such as going to an Ambulatory Clinic like Patient First or Sentara Lake Ridge…you come in with chest pains, they run the EKG and then call an ambulance.
Accreditation is basically to show the clinic is operating under quality standards.
Obviously a women’s clinic is not going to be an entry point to hospitals.
I can see no reason that a physician at one of those clinics should have hospital privileges locally. If he or she did, the anti-choice people would run that person out of town anyway. I have personally witnessed the current clinic owner’s home being picketed by demonstrators, signs and all.
I think all people involved in a clinic, at least medically, should have state licensing.
@Moon-howler
Credentialing is more than the documents certifying the course of study. There is the credentialing with the local Hospitals, the commerical health insurances, Federal programs (Medicare/Medicaid/Tricare) and the Council for Affordable Quality HealthCare (CAQH). There is a whole industry out there of companies who you can work with (pay) to handle the paperwork. Former Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling I believe works for one such outfit here in Virginia.
@Moon-howler
The medical personal (doctors etc) who are required to be licensed are licensed. The regulations I posted way a bit back here also have training requirements for Staff.
The regulation also requires the abortion clinic to have a written agreement with the hospital. That is just a common sense thing to me as I can think of instances where an immediate admit would be needed.
As for local physician who performs procedures at the clinic, well, I know two OB/GYNs that do provide services there…and if their names were known, yeah, maybe the “tar and feather” crowd would get riled.
You know, maybe people need to understand that actual procedure involved in a first trimester abortion. There is no surgical aspect, at all, to this procedure. Your cervix is dilated, that happens for many different gynecological issues and a device is used to extract the several week old fetus. No stiches, not cutting of the woman’s tissue, it is done within about 10 minutes. it is more invasive to get your wisdom teeth pulled than it is to have an abortion. Put aside the emotion and then ask yourself, why should this medical facility be treated than any other? Do you have inspections at your dentist office? At your cosmetic surgeons office where they probably perform many in office procedures?
It’s all about emotion.
And, FYI, if there IS an emergency, at ANY medical facility, I am pretty sure you will be admitted to the ER whether your doctor has privileges or not!
If you have a wisdom tooth surgery gone bad, I don’t think your dentist has hospital privileges. Absolutely, Elena.
You mean you extract the several week old living fetus and kill it. End its living status and its future life. Then you toss it away like it was nothing more than an extracted wisdom tooth. O.K.
That is just dramatic crap and what invalidates so much of what the anti choice folks say. I have not one problem being opposed to abortion for one’s self. I have not one problem with offering other real options for others (past diaper coupons and some baby clothes which we all know is just the tip of the iceberg)
I have a real problem with you flying off about discarding fetuses which at that stage are embryos like they are wisdom teeth. I don’t know a single woman who has ever had an abortion who thought of the procedure like a wisdom tooth extraction and you cheapen yourself to suggest such a thing.
To most people, it is a very painful, difficult decision. I say people because it isn’t always even the woman alone. Sometimes it is her parents, her grandparents, or her husband or significant other. Sometimes the woman goes it alone, and no one knows. It just all depends.
But spare me the girlie analogies. I heard enough crap and misinformation being spewed last night to last me a year.
and NO that isn’t what I mean. I am speaking medically about who has hospital privileges. Like I said.
Dramatic crap is it? Just where is there not truth in that post? Is the fetus not killed? Is its current life and future life not ended by the premeditated decision(s) of others. Are the remains not discarded by a clinic like a piece of unwanted trash? Killing is killing. Women make decisions every day not to do such a thing, no matter how tough a future challenge it may present. Don’t give me groaning and moaning about how tough it is to decide to kill a child in the womb. The real courage is in letting that child live instead of making him or her pay for your own mistakes with its very life.
Wolverine, Let’s start with the basics. There are different stages of development noted for a reason. I don’t know about you but I think there is a huge difference in a zygote and a 3 year old child. One is a sentient being and one is being who might end up as a miscarriage or an octogenarian. Life is uncertain. I would say to you that killing is NOT killing. I certainly would make a distinction between killing that 3 year old and zygote or a snake or a moth or an enemy soldier. As human beings we put different values on those attributes. Who determines when killing is ok? Society. Obviously we have some disagreement in our society, over what is acceptable and what is not.
What is not acceptable, here at least, is for a male such as yourself to sit there and tell me, a female, not to moan and groan over what is probably the most difficult decision most women ever make. I am fortunate. I have never had to make that decision for myself but I have sure sat with a lot of different women and listened to their tears and their agony as they made the gut wrenching decision.
Don’t even try to make it sound easy, like its some binary issue. It is complex and perhaps even more complex that it was 50 years ago.
The real courage is to know when to keep your know-it-all opinions to yourself on issues that you will never experience. I will go so far as to say I bet you have never even talked to someone who might be having to make that horrible decision.
Some abortions aren’t because of the woman’s mistake. Some are because of mother nature’s mistakes.
You do spew dramatic crap. It is girlie sounding and really not even close to dealing accurately with the situation.
Uh-oh … it’s getting hot in here …
I’m going to see if I can help to deescalate …
Wolverine, at what point do you believe that a human embryo becomes a “child”? And, why?
And a second question, if you will … how do you feel about single mothers? Do you lean more towards celebrating their choice, or stigmatizing them for choosing to have an out-of-wedlock child? If it’s ever the latter than you are in danger of basically damning women for having the audacity to get pregnant … people have sex, women get pregnant. Once they’re in that condition, usually there’s no Prince Charming in this day and age who can make that situation whole. They bear a burden that we do not.