Issn Print: 1533-7006

Publication Date: 2006/03/21


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ACADEMIC NEUROLOGY REBUILDS IN NEW ORLEANS

Stephanie Cajigal

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Excerpt

Nearly six months after Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans evacuees have slowly moved back to the city. According to the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals, as of October, only about 140,000 people have returned to New Orleans, which had a population of approximately 462,000 before the storm.
What does a diminished population mean for the medical community? For neurology, it means fewer patients and fewer places to work. And it requires stretching scant resources to meet the need for services.
The two major academic medical centers in New Orleans – Tulane University and Louisiana State University (LSU) – have been forced to lay off faculty members, partly to offset losses in clinical care revenue. Many hospitals in the city were severely damaged by the storm and have been unable to reopen. These include University Hospital, part of the LSU public health care system, which is scheduled to reopen for interim use by July, according to LSU Health Sciences Center spokesperson Leslie Capo.
LSU staff are currently working at different clinics throughout the area, including one for neurology in Baton Rouge. Charity Hospital, an LSU hospital that catered to the city's poor, is operating out of Air Force tents in the convention center, Ms. Capo said. The New Orleans Veterans Affairs Medical Center, previously a 450-bed facility located in the downtown area, is now operating six primary care outpatient clinics and four mobile units throughout southeast Louisiana. Meanwhile, Tulane University Hospital, which has been closed since the hurricane, opened its neurology clinics in February as well as its Emergency Department and inpatient hospital, which includes about 100 beds.
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