Central Maine Hospital Announces it’s Cutting 31 Positions & Reducing Hours For Others

While the United States is nearing record-low unemployment statistics, it doesn't mean that all jobs are without risk of being eliminated. This is now the case for a large healthcare facility in Central Maine.

According to an article published by WGME 13, St. Mary's Hospital, located in Lewiston, Maine, has just announced the elimination of 31 positions and a reduction in hours for some other staff members.

WGME reports that the hospital has been seeing a decline in both patient numbers and revenue recently. This has led hospital administrators to make the tough decision to eliminate some of the positions internally.

The hospital said in a statement that it has been incurring a financial decline over the last half-decade or so. This also led to St. Mary's closing down their longtime maternity ward back in 2022.

A former St. Mary's employee, who wished to remain anonymous, told WGME in part,

"I feel for the employees, I feel for them that this has happened. And you know just their timing -- less than two months after the mass shooting and around Christmas time. I don’t know where the hospitals going to go, I’m worried about it. I mean as good as CMMC is, unless they expand a lot, where are folks going to go?"

WGME reported that a current employee told them that the cuts came 'as a shock' to staff and that the cuts were going into effect immediately- right during the holidays. The current employee, who also wished to remain anonymous, said that she has been working for the healthcare organization for more than 25 years. She went on to tell the news station that this round of layoffs effected people in several departments including maintenance, medical assistants, nurses and case workers.

Hospital leadership said in a statement that they tried to focus the cuts more on operational roles rather than patient-facing roles, WGME reported.