Some employers' insurance plans require the operations to become performed at hospitals with national "center of excellence" designations for wls. Mercy and
Methodist in Des Moines slimming factor have those designations, as do several other Iowa hospitals. Eibes said the Belmond program will be able to have the certification
after it's done 50 from the operations.
A national health care quality expert said patients may want to think hard before seeking the extensive surgery at a new program in a little hospital.
Betsy Imholz, special projects director for Consumers Union, noted her group counsels patients to check on publicly posted reports on hospitals' quality of
care, including infection and complication rates and medical outcomes. Consumers Union, which publishes Consumer Reports magazine, posts a lot of those
reports on its website.
So does the us government, with a website at hospitalcompare.hhs.gov. However, many small hospitals, such as the one in Belmond, do not have statistics
posted on web sites.
Imholz said the lack of comparison data would give her pause if she were a potential patient.
"Consumers should be cautious about subjecting themselves to surgery at a facility about which there is no public information about safety," she wrote within
an email to the Register. "Even when the doctor has experience and it has a strong safety record, the security culture of a hospital is key to low infection,
readmission and medical error rates."
Simonin, the super slim pomegranate capsule hospital's leader, said the facility soon will start posting quality information on the government website, which is not required of small
hospitals. Which should reassure patients, as should Eibes' long history, he explained.