Palo Verde Hospital CEO Sandra Anaya is set to step down from her position with the embattled hospital this week. Jennifer Cruikshank, CEO of Riverside University Health System-Medical Center and Clinics, is set to fill the role on an interim basis.
“I appreciate the courtesy she has extended to me during this transition,” Anaya said of Cruikshank in her resignation letter. “I have full faith in her and the team that has been so gracious, competent, and sincere.”
The decision was made due to the “reorganization of Palo Verde Healthcare District [(PVHD)] for financial purposes,” according to Board Clerk Joanna Gonzalez.
According to a PVHD statement, Anaya had served as CEO of the hospital for nearly 13 years. In her letter, Anaya thanked the prior board members, attorney Lena Wade and interim Chief Financial Officer Michael Rose.
“I truly believe had he not maintained his working relationship with the facility, during these difficult times, all would have been lost,” she said. “He picked up the pieces on so many things that interim CFOs did not address and should have.”
The announcement came less than a month after the board swore in Blythe native Jaclyn Randall to fill the vacancy created by the January 7 resignation of Director Dr. David Brooks.
Randall’s appointment was previously unanimously approved by the Riverside County Board of Supervisors, which was asked to step in after the district failed to complete the appointment process.
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Randall is currently the dean of Palo Verde College Needles Center, a role she was promoted to in 2023, the Palo Verde Valley Times reported.
After taking her seat on the dais, Randall thanked Supervisor V. Manuel Perez for selecting her to fill the seat and addressed those who contacted his office as well as members of the media, including The Riverside Record, with concerns about her background.
“If you had asked me directly, I would have shared with you that what you see in front of you is a result of my background experiences which prepared me for today,” she said. “Due to my experiences, I learned to be humble, seek forgiveness for myself and also my loved ones.”
In an interview with The Record ahead of the meeting, Randall said the drug-related conviction from nearly 20 years ago had been expunged from her record.
“What was once illegal is now legal, and I paid my debts by spending the past 15 years getting more experience by attending school not just to make me and my family proud, but this entire community,” she said at the meeting. “I learned a lot on this path…[and] it was the great perseverance and selfless devotion that required me to reach my goal that was the most impactful.”
The district said Anaya’s departure did not change the terms of the Management Services Agreement between PVHD and the county, nor would it impact the hospital’s current operations.
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Palo Verde Hospital serves a $100 million medical market in Blythe. How could it go possibly go bankrupt?!
Answer: The HMOs enrolled nearly everyone in town and sent them to distant lands for care leaving Palo Verde Hospital with little to do. Utilization dropped by 95%.
It has been said that declines in fees paid by Medicare, Medicaid / Medi-Cal and other health plans lead to the decline and fall of Palo Verde Hospital. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Palo Verde Hospital, like most rural hospitals across America, declined primarily because it focused on the day-to-day while multi-billion dollar HMOs strategized and marketed and grew from the cities and suburbs into the rural highlands, heaths, mountains and desert vallleys.
Health plans received well over $100 million revenue last year to provide medical services to the people of Blythe. Instead of considering their revenues coupled with massive accumulated assets and their ability to recruit doctors and beef up medical resources locally in Blythe they chose instead to direct their member-patients to physicians and hospitals in Indio, Rancho Mirage, Palm Desert, Cathedral City, Palm Springs and Loma Linda.
Seniors and children and the rest were left with no choice but to travel 200 and 300 miles roundtrip for care. A patient in need of surgery makes two pre-op and two post-op visits, five trips in total, and travels 1000 to 1500 miles.
Dr John Raffetto
AmbassadorCare
Washington DC