Do you really get what you pay for?
 

by Tony Blaz - 
KUAM's Political Insider
June 17, 2005

There is an old saying "you get what you pay for", implying that the more you pay the better the product, but is there really any truth to this adage. Recently the Office of the Public Auditor released the findings on the Guam Memorial Hospital and it appears for the second consecutive year GMH's performance was nothing short of dismal or rather abysmal. 

Let's take a look at some of the highlights of the Office of the Public Auditor's audit: GMH's loss for Fiscal Year 2003, amounted to nearly $10 million compared to $2.3 million in Fiscal Year 2002, the compliance and internal control audit indicates that the number of findings of breakdowns in internal control doubled from Fiscal Year 2002 to 45 citations for Fiscal Year 2003.

Of which 14 citations were repeats from last year. From citations on cash receipts indicating there is no segregation of duties with respect to cash, to a citation citing GMH for its inability to identify actual patient accounts it has received for respective payments. Can you believe this you make payment to GMH and your payment can't be applied to your patient account because GMH is unable to do so.

Checks totaling $4.4 million dollars only had the former hospital administrator's signature and was lacking the other required signature. Talk about breakdown in internal controls! GMH was also cited for total unpaid contributions amounting to almost ten million dollars to the retirement fund without a formal promissory note or payment arrangement. And these amounts include actual monies deducted from employees paychecks for their employee contributions to their respective annuities.

Other citations cited by the Public Auditor included numerous instances of non-compliance with procurement regulations and civil service and merit system violations. And the most atrocious citation by the Public Auditor was the fact that GMH was unable to locate or account for numerous items in its inventory of equipment amounting to over $1.4 million. Items like the Du Pont analyzer for laboratory costing more than $150,000. Radiology equipment like the Clinix-R system costing $138,000, the isotopic calibrator costing $6,750 and an x-ray mammogram machine, a laser ekta-scan and an x-ray radio scope costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. 

An ultra sound system, a fetal monitor, a sterilizer for labor and delivery costing nearly a half-million dollars - all missing! And our intensive care unit is missing a vital piece of medical equipment called the Verida monitor, costing $200,000 and that's not all folks, the FY2004 audit is currently under review by OPA, and given all that has happened at GMH over the past several months. I shutter when I think about what other disasters lie waiting to be revealed by the Public Auditor.

For all the money that we have paid to the former administrator, who was hired by the Board of Trustees to turn the hospital around and make it the best healthcare facility in the Western Pacific, I can't help my dear people of Guam but paraphrase an old adage: you don't always get what you pay for!     

Tony Blaz hosts "Positively Local", a radio talkshow on Isla61-AM everyday from 6-10am