CHAFFEE CLINIC TO CLOSE TODAY

CHAFFEE -- The clinic at the North Scott Medical Center in Chaffee will close its doors today.

The announcement comes just five days after the acute-care unit at the hospital also shut down.

The clinic, which has been operating for about a month under the name MedNow, can no longer operate because of a lack of resources and employees, said Dr. Gordon Nunnelly, the physician who ran the clinic.

"There wasn't a lack of people coming to see us, but suddenly, everything was chopped off," he said. "This is a dying situation. I don't think there's any hope to save it."

Nunnelly said clinic employees have not been paid for three weeks, and though they haven't yet quit, they told him they can no longer afford to work without pay.

He said he was forced to close the clinic because it can't operate without clerical and nursing assistance. A lack of x-ray and laboratory services since the hospital closed has also hampered clinic operations, he said.

"This is not something we anticipated," Nunnelly said Tuesday night. "I feel it's not prudent to continue operations not having any backup. If I can't give (patients) the service they deserve I don't think I should try to give them any services."

Employees have been told paychecks are in the mail, Nunnelly said. But, he said, "How than they go on if they don't get paid for three weeks?"

Reached Tuesday, the center's administrator, Cindy Mix, said she wasn't involved enough in the decision to close the clinic to comment. The president of the hospital's board of directors, Walter Hutton, has been out of town since before Friday.

Nunnelly said he did not wish to be a spokesman for the hospital, but commented as an employee only.

He said if he had known of the hospital's dire financial situation prior to opening the clinic, he wouldn't have agreed to become the resident physician.

"I didn't realize the risky financial situation these people were in," he said. "I just wanted to practice medicine and give these people the kind of services they needed. But without adequate resources, I would be shortchanging them."