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COST OF HELIPAD CONSTRUCTION is estimated to be $5.7 million 1, yet the hospital admits that the Main Building, where the helipad location is proposed, will pose a significant risk of partial or total collapse and a danger to the public, in the event of a major seismic event. 2
COSTS OF HELICOPTER PATIENT TRANSFER
- The cost of a single helicopter patient transfer ranges between $15,000 - $20,000, depending on distance traveled and services provided.
- Occasionally, patients have been charged as much as $25,000 (see Wall Street Journal Article: Fatal Crashes.)
- Medicare and Medical will only cover one-third of this cost.
- Some private health insurance plans will pay for 50-75% of the cost, but the patient must pay the remainder.
- Calstar and Reach, the two main Bay Area medical helicopter transport companies, admit they use collection agencies to enforce delinquent payments.
SFGH hopes a helipad will attract fully-insured patients who currently transfer to Stanford, Sacramento or San Jose from other Northern California counties. But if these patients fill our hospital beds, where will the San Franciscans needing emergency care be treated?
COSTS OF EMERGENCY ROOM AVAILABILITY
San Francisco General Hospital was intended to serve San Franciscans (see Mission Statement), but SFGH is already so overcrowded that the Emergency Room is closed to local residents 20% of the time. If additional patients are transferred to SFGH from surrounding counties, this ER diversion rate will increase even more. San Francisco residents having heart attacks, strokes and other medical emergencies will be turned away; as their ambulances hunt for an available ER, some San Franciscans will die.
Learn which patients will actually be flown to a SFGH helipad .Read: .SF Rescues?
Footnotes:
[1] http://www.sfgov.org/site/uploadedfiles/cpp/CCSF_DRAFT_Capital_Plan_2008-2017.pdf , p. 43.
[2]SFGH Institutional Master Plan Update, p. 4-5
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