Grady Woes Hit Big Screens

The fight for survival for Grady Memorial Hospital has been leading news coverage in Atlanta for weeks. The hospital faces a $125 million shortfall that could force it to shut its doors by the end of the year.

Now the fight for Grady has made it to the big screen.

It's not a glitzy Hollywood premiere, but for the few dozen people who filed into an auditorium at Emory University, the preview means more than anything coming out of Hollywood ever will.

It's called "Save Grady."

It is the story of Atlanta's level one trauma center -- the place that teaches a quarter of all the doctors in Georgia, and one of the few indigent care facilities left -- and the story is told through patients like Cheryl Scribner.

"If it goes down," she said, "I'm going down with it."

Scribner was in a car accident, but in the film you find out she's also recently lost her job. She has no insurance, no other hospital would treat her.

"I had to go from hospital to hospital to hospital begging for care and received none, until I got to Grady," she said.

Joann Lewis also lost her job and her insurance, but she lives in Gwinnett County. She's not eligible for treatment at Grady, so her diabetes went untreated for seven months -- and her son, while having an acute asthma attack was turned away from a hospital because of the lack of insurance.

Stories like these led Dr. Neal Schuman to make the documentary.

"Right now there are people who are suffering and dying all over the state because they can't get health care," Schuman said. "We can't let them die, can't let them suffer and we as Georgians feel that way."

The public premiere of the movie is September 5 at the Midtown Art Cinemas. The group is also collecting other Grady stories on its Web site -- SaveGrady.com