Update on June 3: U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Wendy Hagenau approved Hutcheson's plan to replace its ER doctors.
Hagenau ruled that Hutcheson could hire Apollo, a company that provide ER staff to hospitals. The approval was the second part of a two-step process to bring in new doctors.
The first part came last week, when Hagenau ruled that Hutcheson could end its contract with EmCare, the company that had been supplying the emergency department staff.
Court filings show the shift from EmCare to Apollo could happen as soon as 7 a.m. today.
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Hutcheson Medical Center leaders will ask a judge this morning for permission to fire all of their ER doctors later this week.
The Fort Oglethorpe hospital's emergency department is staffed with physicians and other employees who work for an outside business. The hospital administrators want to replace a company called EmCare with another one called Apollo -- bringing a new group into the busiest rooms of the hospital.
A U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge gave Hutcheson preliminary permission last week to fire all of the EmCare doctors as early as Wednesday morning. But before they can do that, they need to find replacements. The hospital's attorneys will go before another judge in Atlanta at 10:30 a.m. and ask for permission to hire the Apollo doctors.
If a judge approves the plan, the men and women on the front lines of the hospital will change overnight.
But EmCare is pushing back. Its lawyers filed a motion Monday asking a judge to stall Hutcheson's action because the hospital didn't announce this plan until May 21. They say their employees haven't had enough time to find new jobs.
"Many of the physicians and staff currently rendering services at HMC will face immediate unemployment as early as (Wednesday)," attorneys Zachary LeVasseur and Craig Rasile wrote in a court motion. "It is inequitable to impose such burdens."
Hutcheson officials gave the current ER staff less than two weeks' notice, EmCare's lawyers say, "out of fear that EmCare's professionals would have uncharacteristically ... walked out of the emergency department."
EmCare wants the judge to delay the plan, allowing the company to manage the emergency department for another 90 days. Their lawyers also say this transition period will give Apollo doctors time to walk the halls of Hutcheson and figure out where all the important medical equipment sits.
Hutcheson Hospital is in Fort Oglethorpe, Ga.EmCare has provided ER doctors and staff to Hutcheson since 2012, when Erlanger Health System employees managed the North Georgia hospital. Erlanger also uses EmCare doctors.
EmCare was already scheduled to leave Hutcheson on July 16 of this year. But in court filings, Hutcheson's attorneys told the judge that they needed to kick EmCare out of their hospital sooner than that.
The lawyers wrote that, based on "best business judgment," firing EmCare doctors was in the hospital's "best interest." They also wrote that Hutcheson patients receive "the best possible care."
The lawyers did not elaborate on what was "best," and one of Hutcheson's attorneys did not return a call or email seeking clarification on Monday. Neither did Hutcheson CEO Farrell Hayes.
Though companies like Apollo and EmCare charge patients for seeing their ER doctors, the emergency departments those companies manage are important for the overall financial health of a hospital.
From 2003-09, according to a Rand Corporation study, the amount of patients who moved from the ER to another part of the hospital -- where the hospital makes money -- increased by 17 percent. This represented almost all of the increase in hospital admissions during the time period of that study.
"(Hospital administrators) should pay closer attention to the role that emergency physicians play in evaluating, managing and preventing hospital admissions," Dr. Andy Sama, the former president of the American College for Emergency Physicians, said in a news release at the time of the study.
From October through April, according to Hutcheson's operating report, an average of 2,400 people each month visited the hospital's emergency room. During that time, hospital's average daily census was 26.
Hutcheson, which filed for bankruptcy in November, also averaged 80 inpatient surgeries and 111 outpatient surgeries a month.
In Hutcheson's contract with Apollo, the company agrees that its ER staffers will bring patients to their Hutcheson physician "if clinically necessary." If the Hutcheson physician isn't available, the ER staffers will ship the patient to another Hutcheson physician.
And if the patients don't have Hutcheson physicians, the ER staffers will find some for them.
If the patients need to see a doctor later, according to the contract, the ER staffers will encourage them to return to their private physicians.
Arthur Steedman, the Apollo vice president who signed the contract, did not return calls seeking comment Monday.
The 2012 contract between Hutcheson and EmCare did not include any language about ER staffers moving patients to Hutcheson physicians. But a spokesman for the company said he didn't think that section of the Apollo contract was relevant, that it was "just a word choice."
Contact staff writer Tyler Jett at tjett@times freepress.com or at 423-757-6476.