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Friday. March 10, 1978
7
Heart surgeon considers leaving
University Daily Kansan
By NANCY DRESSLER
Staff Writer
The only open heart surgeon at the University of Kansas Medical Center said yesterday he would decide this weekend whether to leave the Med Center.
The surgeon, Donald A. Barnhorst, has been chief of the Med Center's cardiothoracic section since December 1976.
Barnhardt said a number of factors, including a lack of heart surgery patients, had contributed to the high rates.
"The volume of operations is just not sufficient. I'm frustrated by not really understanding the process."
BARNORH CAME to the Med Center after a shake-up of surgeons in 1978 left the hospital without anyone to perform heart surgeries for several months.
Surgeons Robert L. Reis and Hamner Hannah III quit their jobs as heart surgeons on Feb. 11, 1976. The surges disputed an inspection of Med Center operating rooms and intensive care facilities that found the facilities safe for patients.
Reis and Hannah said the facilities were unsafe for surgery to be performed in.
The surgeons called the inspection, made by a panel of three outside doctors, a "well-orchestrated whitewash" of actual conditions.
incidents in 1976 had made it hard for the center to attract heart surgery patients.
'ITS A HARD thing for the public to regain confidence in the surgery. It's
"At least 12 patients (since 1976) have turned us down (for surgery). Most patients don't mean it, but it slams our integrity," he said.
A minimum number of heart surgeries is needed, Barnhorst said, to support a surgeon and allow for the training of residents in heart surgery.
More than 300 open heart operations were performed at the Med Center each year between 1973 and 1975, prior to the resignations of Reis and Hannah.
"I don't think KU has to do 1,000 heart's a year. We don't need a cardiac empire but we do need enough surgeries to keep members of a team skilled," he said.
However, in 1976, only 69 open heart surgeries were performed, Barnsori said.
The Inner Society Committee on Heart Disease Resources has recommended that a hospital handle a minimum of 200 open heart operations a year to keep the surgery team and surgeons up to date on techniques, Barnhorst said.
BARNHORST SAID 1977 had been a rebuilding year for heart surgeries at the
However, Barnberst said the rebuilding of the department since 1976 had been successful.
Med Center and 127 operations had been performed.
"At least we got it going again," he said.
The Med Center's new clinical facility, slated for completion next year, may help to alleviate some of the factors that keep nurses on staff at the Med Center for surgery, Barnorst said.
"This place (the Med Center) is every bit as safe as any place in the United States. However, my recognizing it that and the knowing it are two different things," he said.
"Surgical training takes a long time. People who spend that many years at training are not going to be happy without a large number of surgeries," he said.
BARNHORST SAID people at the Med
replacement surgeon are surgeon
to replace him would be difficult.
The lack of surgeries at the Med Center for Others Barnhart, who is in his sixth year as a surgeon.
"It does bother me. I'm a fairly good surgeon. If patients don't come to me, I'll go back."
Barnhorst said he had received several serious job offers from other hospitals and
A SPOKESMAN at St. Luke's Hospital, Kansas. Buried in the parking lot and applied for a position there.
The determining factor, Barnhorst said, would be whether the number of heart operations at the Med Center could be increased in the near future.
"These are my best years. I have my
sales down to a fairly fine line and I'm at my
pivot point."
"I have to decide if the light at the end of the tunnel is one or two years away or 10. If
"If it's one or two, I'm willing to stay to achieve that."
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