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Lewis County Health System will “Unpause”
and Reopen Maternity Services Effective March 25, 2024
Published: November 30, 2023
at 05:45 p.m.
By: Nick Altmire
Lowville, NY- With a crowd
gathered for a ceremony to cut the ribbon on the new surgical pavilion at Lewis County
Hospital this afternoon, Lewis County Health System CEO Jerry Cayer made a
significant announcement as the ceremony concluded just prior to the
cutting of the ribbon.
“We are committed
to delivering babies at the Lewis County General Hospital,” Mr. Cayer said.
“Thus, I am pleased to share that Dr. Georges Akl joins Dr. Lee Dutton,
Nurse Practitioner Danah Ernst, and Nurse Practitioner Hali Reid in the
women’s health practice.”
Mr. Cayer said
that after communicating this positive development with the NYS Department
of Health last week, he was now able to share that “maternity services
will be unpausing, or reopening, on March 25, 2024,” generating an
enthusiastic round of applause and cheers from the crowd on hand. (See the announcement
portion of our video here)
Maternity
services, including the delivery of babies, were “paused” effective
September 25, 2021 at Lewis County General
Hospital after a large number of resignations occurred in the unit
following a New York State mandate requiring a COVID-19 vaccination for
health care workers. The pause was announced during a September 10, 2021 press conference. At the time Mr.
Cayer said that the maternity service was unable to be safely staffed after
September 24, 2021, and due to the number of resignations there was no
choice but to pause the delivery of babies at Lewis County General
Hospital, stressing that the goal was to reopen the service when the
staffing issues could be adequately addressed.
Lewis County
Health System will be releasing more information on the reopening of
maternity services in the coming weeks.
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