Western Missouri Medical Center is set to close one of its family practice clinics in Holden on March 3.
Forty-one positions are set to be eliminated from the hospital in Warrensberg, too.
Chelsea Mudd, the marketing manager at Western Missouri Medical Center, said this was an administrative decision made to reduce costs after looking at patient volume and potential volume.
“There are different healthcare trends and methods changing right now,” Mudd said. “There’s a lot that rural health care organizations are up against. It was a primary goal of our administration to impact patient care as little as possible.”
Out of the 41 positions, 33 were currently staffed. Dr. Patricia Alafaireet, assistant professor in MU’s Department of Health Management and Informatics, said that the community will notice the loss of jobs.
“In a small town, that’s a big impact on the economy,” Alafaireet said. “And in some cases, particularly for rural hospitals, they are the primary source of employment.”
Mudd said that a letter will go out to all patients with information about the two next nearest Western Missouri Family Healthcare clinics in Concordia and Knob Noster. Medical records from the Holden clinic will be transferred if patients choose to visit one of those locations.
Alafaireet said that travelling the extra distance could create a financial burden for patients.
“Let’s look at this,” Alafaireet said. “How much in terms of opportunity cost is it going to cost someone to get a flu shot? And what impact is that going to have on the number of people who actually drive to get one?”
Mudd said Western Missouri Medical Center wants to hear feedback from the community on how to make the transition process easier.