The chief medical officer at Eleanor Slater Hospital and the state agency that oversees it is leaving her post after 10 months on the job.
Dr. Elinore McCance-Katz, who was appointed to head the state-run hospital amid allegations of improper billing practices and patient safety concerns that threatened its accreditation, will be stepping down on July 22, Richard Charest, director of the state Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities and Hospitals, said Thursday in a statement to hospital staff.
Charest credited what he described as the hospital’s “turn-around” to McCance-Katz, who also has been serving as chief medical officer of the BHDDH, a role she previously held from 2015 to 2017.
A psychiatrist who worked in the Trump administration in Washington, D.C., McCance-Katz was appointed to head the state-run hospital in September of 2021.
Slater Hospital, which has campuses in Burrillville and Cranston, serves as Rhode Island’s hospital of last resort for about 200 patients with complex medical and psychiatric needs.
For years, Slater Hospital had been paid for primarily through Medicaid, the federal-state health insurance program for low-income and disabled residents. But the state stopped billing Medicaid for Slater patients in 2019, after hospital employees raised concerns about compliance with Medicaid rules that prohibit billing if more than half of the beds are used for psychiatric patients who are under age 65. And as of May 1, Slater still had too many psychiatric patients – 57.5% – to resume billing Medicaid, Kristin Pono Sousa, state Medicaid Director, said in a June 3 letter to Charest. Rhode Island loses tens of millions in Medicaid funds for periods when Slater Hospital cannot bill for the federal reimbursements.
The hospital’s patient care issues are also under investigation by the Rhode Island attorney general. The investigation involves “both the Medicaid Fraud Control and Patient Abuse Unit in the criminal division and the Health Care Advocate in the civil division,” Brian Hodge, a spokesperson for state Attorney General Peter Neronha, said in an email.
To reduce the psychiatric patient census so that Slater Hospital is eligible for Medicaid, state officials last November announced plans to re-license part of the complex as a stand-alone psychiatric hospital for patients ordered into treatment by the courts. In April, the BHDDH received approval from the state Health Services Council to spin-off the Roosevelt Benton Center in Cranston as a 52-bed psychiatric facility.
The same month, a national nonprofit that accredits hospitals restored Slater Hospital’s full accreditation. The Joint Commission also said it was also recommending the hospital for continued certification for Medicare, the government insurance program for people 65 and older, according to an April 13 letter to Charest, the BHDDH director.
“Dr. McCance-Katz played a pivotal role in the turn-around of the hospital,’’ Charest said in a statement to hospital staff shared with The Public’s Radio. “Undaunted by the challenges that faced us, she steadfastly navigated the hospital forward.”
Charest, who has been serving as Slater Hospital’s director and interim CEO, said McCance-Katz’s accomplishments include “rebuilding of hospital services, reinstituting the admission process, and implementing policies and procedures aimed at improving patient care.”
McCance-Katz also laid the groundwork, Charest said, for expanding services in the out-patient “forensic clinic,’’ for patients court-ordered into treatment. She also worked with colleagues across various agencies, Charest said, to integrate mental health substance use disorder and physician health treatment.
McCance-Katz will name an interim chief medical officer on her last day, Randal Edgar, a BHDDH spokesman, said in an email. A search for a permanent replacement, he said, will be underway soon.
This story has been updated with information from the Rhode Island Attorney General’s office.
Health reporter Lynn Arditi can be reached at larditi@thepublicsradio.org. Follow her on Twitter @LynnArditi
