With four “Immediate Jeopardy” citations in five years, Asheville’s Mission Hospital is on a “merry-go-round” of compliance enforcement by the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, one that won’t stop unless either regulators or HCA Healthcare get serious about making meaningful change, according to State Sen. Julie Mayfield.
Mayfield, a Democratic legislator representing Buncombe County, has called on Mission Hospital to address critical issues with staffing and patient care ever since it was purchased in 2019 by Tennessee-based HCA, which owns more than 190 hospitals across the country.
Mission Hospital in particular has faced scrutiny because of numerous noncompliance issues that federal inspectors found over the years. The most severe of these violations can result in an Immediate Jeopardy designation, which is the most serious enforcement finding CMS may issue…