KENNETT, Mo. — The sudden closure of a hospital has left some expectant mothers in the Missouri Bootheel region scrambling for care in an area that already has one of the highest infant mortality rates in the U.S.
St. Louis Public Radio reports that Twin Rivers Regional Medical Center in Kennett recently announced that it will close in July. The closure will leave the surrounding area in southeast Missouri without an OB-GYN. A hospital in neighboring Pemiscot County is taking on the Kennett hospital’s OB-GYN and four other physicians, but that hospital is struggling to stay afloat, too.
Dr. Nelson Perez has been the only full-time OB-GYN at the Kennett hospital for several years. He said he typically delivers around 400 babies each year — about 100 more than a typical OB-GYN. When the hospital closes, his practice will close.
“I got carpal tunnel in my hands,” Perez said. “I guess after all those deliveries.”
Dunklin County, where Perez works, is the second-poorest county in Missouri and has some of the worst birth outcomes in the state. Babies die at twice the national average and one-in-five black children are boon premature.
Perez said he was blindsided by news the hospital would close, even though he is on the hospital’s board and has served as chief of staff for more than a decade. He thought ownership by a Fortune 500, Community Health Systems, provide security, especially since the hospital turned a profit last year.
He is no longer doing deliveries. The next nearest obstetrics unit is in Poplar Bluff, an hour’s drive away. Many of his patients can’t afford a car.
