Posted on 08/20/2004 8:48:08 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
LOS ANGELES, Aug. 20 - A crisis in Los Angeles County's emergency health care system became more acute this week with the announcement that the oldest hospital in the San Fernando Valley would close by Dec. 31, officials said here Friday.
News of the closing of the institution, the Northridge Hospital Medical Center campus in the Van Nuys section, which opened in 1929, follows by a week the closing of the emergency room at Elastar Community Hospital in the East Los Angeles neighborhood.
In the last two years, four other emergency rooms, most in low-income areas, have closed in the county, primarily because of the high cost of treating thousands of uninsured people, officials said.
"We're mandated to treat anyone who comes in through those doors, regardless of their ability to pay," Tracey Veal, a spokeswoman for the Northridge hospital, said.
Ms. Veal estimated that the hospital had spent $13 million on so-called charity care in the fiscal year that ended on June 30. In addition, she said, the hospital faced $16 million bill for state-ordered earthquake retrofitting and could not afford it.
Since 1990, 70 hospital emergency rooms and trauma centers have closed in California, a state whose emergency and trauma system is overwhelmed and underfinanced, health officials say.
"This is definitely cause for alarm," Carol Meyer, director of the Los Angeles County Emergency Medical Services Agency, said on Friday in an interview. "The whole system is more and more tenuous."
A severe shortage of nurses is adding to the distress, Ms. Meyer said, as new state regulations actually require adding nurses. The rules, starting on Jan. 1 and meant to be applied around the clock, say there must be no more than four patients per nurse in an emergency room. In intensive-care units, the ratio is two to one. In severe trauma cases, it is one to one, and in medical and surgical wards six to one.
"We are in real tough times here," Ms. Meyer said. "I don't know what the solution is going to be. The ultimate answer, of course, is money. It's not going to change until somebody in a high position has a family member die because they couldn't get treatment in an emergency room."
Fewer and fewer doctors, she said, are willing to be on call to emergency rooms, given the high insurance premiums they must pay and, in many cases, the lack of reimbursement for treating the uninsured.
Ms. Meyer said 30 percent of the nine million people in the county were underinsured or had no medical insurance at all. Statewide, seven million people are uninsured, according to the California Medical Association.
"It used to be that physicians would build their practice by working in an emergency room," said Ms. Meyer, who formerly instructed paramedics. "Now they do contracts with H.M.O.'s. They don't need to be on call."
The 500 hospitals in the state are "on the verge of a whole series of unraveling events," said Dr. Jack Lewin, executive director of the California Medical Association, which represents the interests of the 35,000 doctors in the state.
Uncompensated health care, Dr. Lewin said, affects everyone in the system.
"No place is safe when you have large volumes of people who need care, but there's no one to pay for it," Dr. Lewin said. "Employers are increasingly forced to dump coverage of their employees and their dependents. The state used to bail us out, but no more."
Jerry Conway, president of the 209-bed Northridge Hospital Medical Center, one of 42 such centers owned by Catholic Healthcare West in California, Arizona and Nevada, said the hospital has been losing $1 million a month for a year. The hospital, which delivers 250 babies a month and has 26,000 emergency-room visits a year, has worked out a plan to transfer much of its workload to Valley Presbyterian Hospital, a mile east, Mr. Conway said. Northridge Hospital's sister center on Roscoe Boulevard, eight miles west, will stay open.
Not once is the word illegal to be found.. but uninsured is mentioned a few times. hmmm?
Hey, I know, lets elect two East Coast, liberal attorneys into the White House, one of whom made his vast fortune by SUING DOCTORS FOR HELPING WOMEN GIVE BIRTH!
What, that won't lower our healthcare costs and encourage doctors to treat more patients?!
Go figure...
5 Legislative Days Left Until The AWB Expires
Nah, this is the flagship of the American Media.... /sarcasm
The word "illegal" isn't mentioned on my real estate tax bill either where it spells out that 12% of the increase goes for "indigent healthcare." It isn't spelled out in the $833,000,000 tax increase levied on citizens in the past year, either. I guess the 40% increase in illegals since the last election just isn't important to anyone but the taxpayers.
They can't afford to comply with the regulations of the state, so they shut their doors.
But, the Marxist/socialist NY Times quotes no one who says they will close because they are overregulated, but rather government agents who say it is because they are underfunded.
Seems like Atlas is beginning to shrug in the health care market in Kalifornistan.
The Dems want more illegal immigrants. That way, with the collapse of emergency care, they can innitiate nation wide health care...until we go belly up.
The comment made in the article that nothing will change until a politician loses a loved one who got turned away or was unable to get medical care promptly was on.
Congre$$ doesn't have to worry about their own as their care is top notch,, and thus fail to see how tenuous life is for so many these days.
Goodpoint. That's a helluva dastardly idea, but certainly not inconsistent with the sociadems agenda for America.
This month I got my half year statement from my auto insurance company - you know, the one that gives discounts for safe driving... Having not had any tickets, I looked forward to a reduction in my payments. To my surprise, my rate was raised, with a note on the bottom of my statement that said it was necessary so that "everybody could be covered." Excuse me? Since when am I paying for anyone but myself? Note to self: CALL COMPANY, DEMAND EXPLANATION!
Non NY Times-speak synopsis:
State and federal mismanagment of immigration policy and border enforcement combined with costly state regulations forces closing of the oldest hospital in the San Fernando Valley, the 71st closing of a hospital emergency room since 1990.
I made my "legal" entrance into this world at this hospital long ago. When I last saw it a few years ago the buildings have really deteriorated.
The Dems want more illegal immigrants.
So do the Republicans. Illegal immigration is soaring thanks to Jorge W. Bush.
The word "illegal" isn't mentioned on my real estate tax bill either where it spells out that 12% of the increase goes for "indigent healthcare."
I made a mistake in my comment. I made it sound like the figure is merely 12% of the increase. It's actually 12% of the total real estate tax bill.
That's their excuse for pushing for liscenses for illegals...like they can afford car insurance on what they earn.
because I could get rid of the $2,000 cast for a broken arm, $20,000 childbirth hospital fee, $450 monthly payroll deduction for medical, skyrocketing education costs for rooms crowded with "extra" students, standing room only emergency rooms, family businesses closed due to unfair competition... that comes from "supporting" all the hidden costs needed to "provide" lettuce at 89 cents!
The more emergency rooms and hospitals that close in these illegal and bum-infested areas, the further away the illegals and bums have to go for emergency care. And therefore, the greater the opportunity for Darwin to work.
"...Ms. Meyer said 30 percent of the nine million people in the county were underinsured..." and should have said, "uninsured illegal aliens who have undermined and bankrupted our system." "Now, services to our elderly and insured Americans, have been compromised. We are in crisis, as is the entire school system." Next up: New Bond Tax to homeowners to bail out hospitals and schools.
(It happened here in Sonoma, CA, about $140.00 worth yearly. AND, they blamed the high costs on the elderly Americans living longer! Not on the illegals getting primary care in ER or the hundreds of unreimbursed births, surgeries, etc. Eventually, the librals here will get it.)
Never thought of that! Thanks...
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