December 22, 2021

Maureen Corcoran, Director

Ohio Department of Medicaid
50 West Town Street, Suite 400
Columbus, OH 43215

Director Corcoran,

This letter is to urge you to consider Summa Health to be a “distressed hospital” eligible for state hospital
workforce incentive financial support under H.B. 169.

Summa is the largest safety net health system for the Greater Akron region. According to the Ohio
Hospital Association’s second quarter volume 2021 data, Summa manages 68.2% of all adult inpatient
care for Medicaid recipients across Summit, Stark, Portage, and Medina counties. The health system also
manages 59.2% of all adult emergency department visits generated within this defined region.
Since March 2020, the health system has treated more than 9,800 COVID-19 patients either in the
emergency department or as an inpatient hospitalization.
As we write this letter, Summa is managing:

 35% of the region’s COVID positive patients presenting in hospitals across the four-county
region.
 49% of the region’s COVID patients who are receiving ICU care.
 58% of the region’s COVID patients who require vent support.

Today, the system has 180 COVID patients under its care. This is nearly double the volume of any
other provider within the region.
Please note Summa is serving this disproportionately high percentage of the region’s total COVID
patients with limited staffing. This is concerning to us. The health system’s current nursing turnover rate
is 15.58%. In 2019, the turnover rate was 9.41%. The staffing challenges have caused the health system
to also be on diversion which means it is unable to accept new patients from outside of its system.
Summa is also managing a growing emergency department (ED) boarder situation which is
unprecedented for the Akron market. Boarders are patients who wait extraordinary lengths of time in an
emergency department for an inpatient bed to become available. Summa’s patients are waiting, on
average, 48 hours to receive a bed.
COVID patients have taken over the system. The patient population currently occupies thirty percent of
Summa’s available inpatient beds. At Summa Barberton Hospital, forty percent of the beds are dedicated
to COVID patients. On December 6, 2021, Summa stopped overnight elective procedures and redirected
staff to serve patients in the emergency department, medical/surgical, and critical care units.
The Summa Health system is in a crisis state. We urge you to use the resources we supported in H.B. 169
to provide necessary state workforce incentives so that our region can manage through this crisis.
Sincerely,

Bill Roemer Emilia Sykes Vernon Sykes

State Representative, District 38 State Representative, District 34 State Senator, District 28
Chair, House Finance Subcommittee House Minority Leader Ranking Member, Senate
on Health and Human Services Finance Committee

Kristina Roegner Jerry C. Cirino Tavia Galonski

State Senator, District 27 State Senator, District 18 State Representative, District 35
Chair, Senate Government Oversight &
Reform Committee

Diane Grendell Gail Pavliga Sharon Ray

State Representative, District 76 State Representative, District 75 State Representative, District 69

Casey Weinstein Bob Young

State Representative, District 37 State Representative, District 36