Sinai - MC Merger which is located at Haggerty and Cooley Lake roads in Commerce Township. "To now have a Sinai gives them the opportunity for reach- ing out and bringing in more pa- tients who would have a very positive view of Sinai quality and Jewish tradition. So doctors who practice in that area and whose patients live out there will now have the option to ad- mit them to Huron Valley. That'll mean more patients and will strengthen Huron Valley's financial situation, although it will draw down patients from the main Sinai campus. But if they're consolidating Sinai and Grace, it's also within DMC's in- terest to consolidate operations in Detroit," Mr. Horwitz added. But the real question for a "niche" hospital like Sinai is how to maintain niche concerns serving Jewish doctors and pa- tients in a larger system, he said. Mr. Schaengold said other Jewish hospitals in the country that have affiliated with net- works have retained their iden- tities, such as Mt. Zion in San Francisco. But many more have dis- appeared altogether. Today, 10 independent Jewish hospi- tals remain in the United States, seven of them in New York City. The merger is a winner for Sinai and DMC. There are fewer freestanding general hospitals anywhere, for that matter. In the Detroit area, Botsford, North Oakland Med- ical Centers, Mt. Clemens Gen- eral and about 10 others are still independent. However, NOMC is seeking partnership arrange- ments, as are Pontiac Osteo- pathic Hospital and Mt. Clemens General. "It's only a matter of time be- fore they get subsumed or go out of business altogether," Mr. Hor- witz said. The last big merger in the city of Detroit was St. John's acquisi- tion of Holy Crass in the past year. Mt. Carmel Mercy's acquisition by DMC preceded that. A few months ago, Henry Ford Hospital System acquired Horizon Health System, including Bi-County Health System in Warren and Riverside in Trenton. Henry Ford is the second largest hospital net- work in the region. DMC is the third-largest hos- pital network in the metro region, with revenues of $1.3 billion in 1995. With the merger, it has the second-high- est number of licensed beds — 3,000 — and owns 7 hospitals and 45 outpatient facilities. One of its holdings is the former Woodland Clinic, now called DMC Health Care Centers, which was staffed primarily by Sinai physicians before DMC took it over in 1986. ❑ But Is It Kosher'? While other hospitals compete for Jewish clients by offering frozell kosher meals, Sinai will cogillue tote the only - one to have a kosher &cliff JILL DAVIDSON SKLAR STAFF WRITER N ear the turn of the cen- tury, back when Sinai Hospital was only a dream, a group of Or- thodox Jews marched down Hastings Street and rallied in support of the formation of a Jewish hospi- tal that would serve kosher food. The year was 1912. The march netted $7,000 in nickels and dimes that served as the start- ing point for what later became Sinai Hospital. That the need for the hospital would later evolve to include a place for Jewish doctors to prac- tice medicine did not diminish the support for such a kitchen in a health-care institution. When Sinai finally opened its doors to the public in 1953, it had the only fully supervised kosher kitchen in a Michigan hospital. It still does. Although Jewish doctors prac- tice in virtually all of the area's hospitals, no other hospital boasts a kitchen under the supervision of an Orthodox rabbinic council. And that will not change under the sale agreement between Sinai and the Detroit Medical Center (DMC), the secular organization which will take control of the Jew- ish hospital in the next month. "We intend to continue offer- ing the same kosher services at Sinai as have been offered in the past," said Shari Cohen, di- rector of public relations at DMC. In addition, DMC is planning to augment its kosher services in the next few years by imple- menting a kosher kitchen in the Huron Valley Hospital, Ms. Co- hen said. Not only will the Com- merce Township hospital carry a Star of David in its logo but its kitchen will also be under the su- pervision of the. Council of Ortho- dox Rabbis (Vaad Harabonim), the same rabbinical organization that currently oversees kosher op- erations at Sinai, she said. Rabbi Joseph Krupnick, a kosher inspector for the Vaad, said the Council has not been ap- prised of the future of kosher su- pervision by Sinai's new owners. However, they would be pleased to offer such services to the sub- urban branch of Sinai. "If we got the call, we would do it, most definitely," Rabbi Krup- nick said. And just as other area hospi- tals have welcomed Jewish doc- tors to their staffs, so, too, have some provided rabbinic chap- laincy as well as kosher meals. While no area hospital other than Sinai has a sanctioned kosher kitchen, kosher meals are available to kashrut observant patients, the hospitals say. A spokesperson said Henry Ford Health Systems has "a small but regular demand" for kosher food. It keeps a constant supply of frozen kosher meals in sealed containers. Disposable sil- verware is also provided. But Rabbi Krupnick of the Council of Orthodox Rabbis doesn't agree that everything is kosher at other hospitals. "They may call it kosher, but there is very little resemblance between that and the reality," he said, adding that in some hospitals "kosher" means omitting pork from the menu. To ensure such frozen meals are in fact kosher, the Vaad sends an inspector regularly to William Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak and Providence Hos- pital in Southfield, the two oth- er local hospitals to which the Vaad provides some measure of supervision. Even then, other items ac- companying a meal, such as jam at breakfast, may not carry a kosher supervision heksher, he said. ❑ - y415 k.v, ;.atmst4441 6. .aau 4,1,"00,XV .4 .