Well, they've really screwed the pooch this time. Troubled King Drew Medical has failed the inspection that would mean life or death for its $200-million in Medicare and Medicaid funding. Failing 9 of 23 standards, the hospital's fate is now even more uncertain.
Way to go, guys ...
Though no one's saying what will become of the inner city hospital, which serves a largely poor, black and Latino community, the options are pretty grim. Downsize it, privatize it or shut it down altogether. County officials are meeting Monday to discuss their options.
It's already been downsized by default, losing its trauma center last year and forcing patients to ride the ambulance merry-go-round until they can find a place to land that can take them. Harbor has taken the brunt of the patients, but the additional load is straining an already overtaxed hospital, making it necessary to shuttle trauma victims to hospitals even further away.
I personally don't see how privatization will help. The problem is the quality of the patient care, the economic means of the patients and the inability of the County health department to adequately deal with the problem. Privatization is not going to change the fact that it serves an overwhelmingly poor population that depends on Medicare and Medicaid to basic emergency care.
Then there's shutting it down.
Earl Ofari Hutchinson of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable said that closing the hospital "would be a monumental health care disaster for the underserved, economically distressed residents of South Los Angeles."
Couldn't have said it better myself, Earl.
Already emergency rooms like the one at Inglewood's Memorial hospital are shutting down. Why? Money, of course.
"Because people don't have access to their own primary-care physician, they're using our emergency room," said Rembis, whose health system is losing $30 million a year. "We need to find a better way to provide care."
More than 60% of the Memorial ER patients had non-emergency conditions. If they had had adequate preventive medical care they wouldn't be using the ER as their primary health care.
This is the toppling of one more domino in the County health system. We can't handle many more before it completely collapses.
Posted by: S_Blackmoore on Sunday, September 24, 2006 - 10:14 PM
