Don’t let St. Vincent Hospital restrict
access to health care in Santa Fe
St. Vincent Hospital in Santa Fe has announced it is going to “partner” with CHRISTUS Health System and has agreed that the hospital will follow Catholic Religious Directives in providing health care services to all of its patients.
This means that family planning, reproductive health services and patients’ ability to control their own end-of-life decision-making could be seriously restricted, fragmented or even eliminated entirely.
The Southwest Women’s Law Center helped to form and is one of the leaders of a coalition of organizations committed to ensuring that patients in Santa Fe continue to control their own health care decisions based on their own personal beliefs in consultation with their doctors. The State, through the Department of Health and the Department of Human Services, asked St. Vincent to delay the deal until such assurances could be obtained. We intend to monitor events at the Hospital to ensure that patients will continue to have access to family planning and reproductive health care services in Santa Fe and that religious authorities do not exercise control over difficult decisions made by patients and their loved ones at the end of life.
You can find more information about the merger at the coalition’s website at www.SVHmerger.org.