UNSTRAPPED: SEAT BELT DEFIANCE COSTS

Motorists who shun seat belts and have no medical insurance account for roughly more than $320,000 in uncompensated trauma care at St. Francis Medical Center in Cape Girardeau.

The figure covers the hospital's fiscal year that ran from July 1, 1990 to June 30, 1991. Southeast Missouri Hospital in Cape Girardeau keeps no similar figures.

St. Francis Trauma Care Coordinator Sandy Geile said the figure covered the cost of treating about 34 patients. The average cost of treatment comes to just over $9,100.

"So the average person who does carry insurance and pays their bills (is) supporting the uninsured, and we're supporting the uninsured who engage in the high-risk behavior who don't wear their seat belts to the tune of $320,000 a year just at this facility," she said.

"People with insurance, that's who support all of health care. That's why your insurance premiums go up; that's why our hospital costs go up. That's why trauma care is so expensive."

Trauma injuries, Geile said, include major fractures and internal injuries.

Geile said she couldn't say whether the figure was up or down compared to past years. She said St. Francis has only tracked the data since Jan. 1, 1990, when changing legislation required trauma centers to keep the data along with other information.

By comparison, motorists who don't have medical insurance but who wear seat belts accounted for more than $60,000 in uncompensated care over the same period. Geile said that came to roughly one-fifth of the other figure.

"So obviously the seat belt is the determining factor there," said Geile. "Obviously we support the use of seat belts for uncompensated and compensated. It helps save the cost of health care insurance."

The trauma services coordinator at Southeast, Cathy Magas, said the hospital keeps no similar figure on uncompensated care for accident victims who don't wear seat belts. But Magas said of the hospital's patients who are seriously injured in vehicle accidents and require long-term hospitalization, "the greater majority of those are not wearing seat belts."

"Overall trauma, we have about a 41 percent reimbursement," she said.

Of St. Francis' uncompensated care figure, Sharee Galnore, coordinator of the Cape Girardeau Community Traffic Safety Program, said: "I think that it points out very clearly to us when people are not wearing their seat belts their injuries are more severe and their medical costs are going to be more expensive. And at the same time those are costs that hospitals do not receive compensation for."

Galnore said the traffic safety program is now working with 25 organizations and businesses to educate their members and employees about using seat belts.

The effort started in August. The organizations and businesses survey their members and employees, with the hope of having a 70 percent seat-belt usage rate, she said. In 30 days, they carry out the surveys again. If the 70 percent usage rate is maintained, said Galnore, the businesses and organizations are eligible for an award.

President George Bush has mandated that the nation work toward a 70 percent seat-belt usage rate by 1992, she said. The national effort is called "70 by 92." Galnore said Missouri has a similar effort called "70 By Now."

"On the local level we're working to reach that goal (of 70 percent) as soon as possible," said Galnore.

A survey in Cape Girardeau in May put the seat-belt usage rate at 60 percent, she said.