Hospitals Los Angeles County

The county's Emergency Medical Services Commission and county supervisors called on the state Legislature on Monday to convene a special session to approve more funds for Los Angeles County's ailing trauma network. The request came at a hearing on the dwindling resources available to the county's 13 trauma centers, which have lost 50% of their state funding this year alone.

Long Beach residents may have stopped the closure of their beloved Community Medical Center. But will they still recognize the hospital they have saved? To give the 76-year-old hospital new life, investors and doctors from Termino Avenue to Tennessee will submit proposals this week to reinvent one of Southern California's oldest health care facilities. The result promises to be a leaner facility that is part hospital, part clinic and part school.

The network of hospitals in Los Angeles County that provides emergency trauma care to 16,000 patients annually is once again in critical condition, with some of the 13 centers saying that their survival is threatened. The private hospitals that treat victims of freeway accidents and gunshots and handle other emergencies face a serious shortage of money at a time when neither private insurance companies nor governments are eager to pay for an expensive--although vital--level of medical care.

The county Board of Supervisors on Tuesday formally declared peace in its epic, internecine battle over the size of County-USC Medical Center by agreeing to a deal with state legislators to build a hospital in Baldwin Park. "I think we've arrived at a very good solution and one we can carry out effectively," Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke said.

Moving to end one of Los Angeles County's longest-running political feuds, state legislators early Friday agreed to help build a new public hospital in the San Gabriel Valley, allowing the county to downsize County-USC Medical Center. Under the deal, the historic County-USC facility in Boyle Heights will be rebuilt with the 600-bed capacity the county wanted, rather than the 750 beds Eastside lawmakers desired.

Negotiations between newly unionized Los Angeles County doctors and county officials reached an impasse this week, and the physicians said they may undertake job actions at public health clinics because of a contract dispute. The battle is the doctors' first significant conflict with management since more than 800 of them became the largest group of U.S. physicians to unionize in nearly two decades. The doctors voted last year to join the Union of American Physicians and Dentists.

A contract between St. John's Hospital & Health Center in Santa Monica and Blue Cross expired late Friday, which could make visits to that hospital more expensive for as many as 33,000 patients covered by the insurer. St. John's officials, who could not be reached for comment Friday, said earlier in the week they would not continue to accept Blue Cross because it had failed to adequately reimburse the hospital for patient care.

It may look like a simple machine, but a new piece of equipment at Glendale Memorial Hospital and Health Center can create quick 3-D images that will not only make tests easier on patients but help doctors make better diagnoses. About 25 patients a day are utilizing the $1.5-million Siemens "multi-slice" spiral CT scanner, which is used to detect cancer, tumors, kidney stones, abnormal bleeding and fractures, among other ailments.

To keep 10 private hospitals from making good on a threat to close their trauma centers, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has agreed to a month-to-month contract extension for the next six months, officials said Monday.

As Los Angeles County and the state and federal governments inched closer to a deal to fund the nation's second-largest public health system Tuesday, more than 150 doctors, workers and patients marched on the county Hall of Administration demanding a swift end to the delays, which have thrown their futures in doubt. "I'm here to talk about a crime," Beth Osthimer, a lawyer with San Fernando Valley Neighborhood Legal Services, said to a cheering crowd of doctors, workers and uninsured patients.