AIHM agrees that the answer is a 350 bed state of the art hospital in on Maui. What would really answer our needs is for that hospital to be a PRIVATE, teaching hospital. A government hospital will never be able to offer the quality of care and the services that the good people of Maui deserve. As long as the government has control over our Maui hospitals, it will have its hands in the cash register and stop us from taking profit and turning it into capital improvements. 

What this hospital should not be is “Maui Memorial” in a new building. That would be completely counterproductive. Private hospitals run efficiently because there is a bottom line. Government hospitals run sloppy because they are bottomless money pits. Private hospitals, profit or non profit, must answer to a board, and therefore, must run like a well oiled machine. Government hospitals answer to the government with an open hand. When MMMC does make a profit, the money goes to Oahu.

A private hospital is for all Maui County people. It is private only in that it doesn’t get paid for by your tax dollars, instead, it pays taxes.

Maui Memorial should become a combination of PRIVATE hospital services including mental health, long term rehabilitation and long term nursing care. None of these services will be so hard on an aging structure. 

Placing a failed organization in a pretty new building leaves you with just that: a dressed up failed organization. 

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Jan Shields L.V.T., B.S.N., R.N.C.