Supervisor candidates Bernard Parks, Mark Ridley-Thomas discuss healthcare issues of L.A.'s 2nd District
The Times is asking the two major candidates competing to succeed Los Angeles County Supervisor Yvonne B. Burke about some key issues in the 2nd District, which stretches from Mar Vista through South Los Angeles and into Compton and Carson.
Today, Los Angeles City Councilman Bernard C. Parks and state Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas (D-Los Angeles) offer their solutions to healthcare issues facing the county and the district, including a growing budget deficit in the county's Health Services Department, large numbers of uninsured patients and the failure, so far, to reopen Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Medical Center, formerly known as Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center, near Watts, as promised.
Between now and the June 3 election, the candidates will address other questions in this occasional series.
Question: What specific steps should be taken to get the hospital reopened, including ways to pay for and ensure quality patient care there? Is a county partnership with another entity, such as the University of California or a private healthcare provider, a desirable option?
Parks:
Last year's closure of King-Harbor as a full-service hospital was not merely a symbolic defeat for the community. It was a stunning blow to the healthcare needs of the most medically under-served population in Los Angeles County.
While urgent care is still provided, the closure was a falling domino that dispersed patients into emergency rooms at already overcrowded hospitals elsewhere in the region. About 250 ambulance rides a month take patients from King to county emergency rooms elsewhere.
King-Harbor must be reopened as a full-service hospital at the earliest possible date under the management of a competent and accountable partner. I am not comfortable with a quickie Band-Aid-type fix, however, and I fear that may happen if we rush too quickly to accept a new management that would try to do too much too soon.
I believe in reopening King-Harbor in stages. Our first priority should be to restore it as a quality inpatient care community hospital. As that is accomplished, we can then add specialty services like trauma care, specialized surgeries and specialized critical care functions. We need to build a core of medical expertise that is solid and stands on its own merits for the long haul.
