Eighty-one percent of the more than 100 Emory Healthcare workers who, this past September, were told they were going to be laid off will be rehired to new positions within Emory Healthcare, the company announced Nov. 15.
After deciding on the layoffs, Healthcare officials devised a plan in which workers could either elect to apply for new openings in Emory Healthcare or seek other employment, in which case they would be provided assistance in finding new jobs as well as severance packages, which are payments and benefits employees receive upon leaving employment at a company, Chief of Psychiatric Services Mark Rapaport said. The opportunity to reapply for jobs became available due to the restructuring of inpatient psychiatry units at Emory.
The Wheel reported in September that previously, three inpatient psychiatry units existed at Emory: two at the Wesley Woods Geriatric Hospital and one at the Center for Rehabilitative Medicine. The recent restructuring downsized the hospital to two units, resulting in the layoffs. But, changes in the way the neuropsychiatry unit operates allowed for most of the employees to reapply for new job openings.
According to Vincent Dollard, associate vice president for health sciences communications, as of Nov. 15, 81 percent of the laid off employees have been placed into open positions. Dollard wrote in an email to the Wheel that the other 19 percent of employees are receiving severance packages. Rapaport added that some of the laid off employees chose to seek jobs with private hospitals in Atlanta.
The restructuring of the unit comes with a change in the model of care being used, Rapaport said. While previously the neuropsychiatry unit was "essentially a non-academic unit," the new changes reflected a shift toward academic-focused care.
"We really wanted to highlight the training of medical students and fellows and integrate our training programs into our outpatient clinics and all of our inpatient units," Rapaport said. "That's what we're in the process of doing right now."
Rapaport said the restructuring was intended to produce versatile workers who could interact with different groups of people in an environment where medical students are being trained.
"We're asking our staff to be able to take care of not just one special group of people but also to expand their skill set so they can be on the geriatric unit or the adult unit depending on where the need is," Rapaport said.
Rapaport said the changes were difficult but necessary.
"We didn't take this move lightly, and we don't take the impact of this move on peoples' lives lightly either," he said. "We knew this was disruptive for people and tough but we felt it was something we had to do."
– By Harmeet Kaur
Photo by James Crissman
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