Saving the Safety‐Net Hospital: Entangled Rhetorics of Life and Death in Hospital Advertising

Abstract

This article examines the public discourse around Grady Memorial, a safety‐net hospital in Atlanta, GA, navigating financial vulnerability, its historical obligation to provide health care for the underserved, and the conflicting needs of its diverse stakeholders. Using a rhetorical analysis I examine the use of near‐death metaphors to frame the complexity and precarity of Grady's situation in coverage of its near‐closure crisis in 2007 and in an iteration of its 2013 advertising campaign. The analysis shows that while saving patients’ lives and saving the livelihood of health‐care institutions are interdependent processes, the language and images used to talk about Grady prioritize its role as a medical provider over its importance as a civic institution. In order to sustain both the medical and civic support a safety‐net hospital provides its community, an implication of the analysis suggests the need for systematic research to understand stakeholders’ attitudes and perceptions toward its health‐care institutions.