Western Medical Center Anaheim

United Western Medical Centers, a small nonprofit health-care company that has been straining to compete against bigger rivals, said it plans to sell its two hospitals and a nursing facility in Orange County to a nationwide hospital chain. The facilities are being sold to OrNda HealthCorp., making the Nashville, Tenn.-based chain the largest hospital operator in Orange County, hospital industry officials said. OrNda currently operates four local hospitals.

A local hospital with a contract to provide care for Orange County Jail inmates discharged a seriously ill prisoner on the eve of open-heart surgery last month, leading to charges that the facility tried to avoid the costs of providing the operation. Jesus Perez Espinosa, 48, of Orange says he was abruptly forced out of Western Medical Center-Anaheim on Sept. 5, the day before he was scheduled to have a diseased heart valve replaced.

An inmate escaped from Western Medical Center's custody ward dressed in a nurse's uniform Thursday afternoon but was caught by hospital security guards a block away, authorities said. Pamela Lynn Elliott, 38, who was arrested earlier this month on suspicion of possessing stolen property, walked away from the custody ward in the 1000 block of South Anaheim Boulevard about 4:40 p.m., the Sheriff's Department said.

Charlotte Cox lies on a table with 22 green, red, blue and yellow electrodes glued to her head. As she relaxes, the electroencephalograph machine she is wired to steadily spits out reams of graph paper filled with black zigzagging lines. Across the room, a fellow classmate, also sprawled out on a laboratory table, is having his head blown dry with an air hose so wires can be secured to his skull.

A national report card on patient safety gave a failing grade to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, one of the country's most prestigious hospitals and one of only 25 nationwide to receive such low marks. In a report issued Wednesday, the Leapfrog Group, an employer-backed nonprofit group focused on healthcare quality, gave a letter grade of F to UCLA Medical Center for performing poorly on several measures tied to preventing medical errors, patient infections and deaths. Leapfrog withheld a failing grade for UCLA in June when it released its first-ever hospital safety scores to give low-performing hospitals time to show improvement.

A woman walking against a red light and outside the crosswalk was struck by a car and killed Tuesday, police said. The victim, who was not identified pending notification of relatives, died at Western Medical Center-Anaheim shortly after the 6:50 a.m. accident on Katella Avenue at Walnut Street, police said. The woman was hit by an eastbound car driven by a 23-year-old Anaheim woman, who was not identified.

An Anaheim resident who was apparently trying to cross Lincoln Avenue outside a crosswalk suffered fatal injuries late Friday when he was struck by a van, police said. Marcelino Ortega, 75, was treated by paramedics and taken to Western Medical Center-Anaheim, where he died. Police said the van was driven by a 44-year-old Buena Park man. No arrest was made, police said, and the accident is under investigation.

A 4-year-old boy drowned in his backyard pool late Tuesday, authorities said. His name was not released. An Orange County sheriff's spokeswoman said the boy was found about 9 p.m. in the pool on the 7700 block of Yorkshire Avenue and taken to Western Medical Center-Anaheim, where he was pronounced dead. The boy's father was home at the time, she said.

A man was shot to death late Saturday in an unincorporated area near Anaheim, the Orange County Sheriff's Department said. Raul Moran, 51, was shot multiple times in the torso near an apartment building in the 10000 block of Garza Avenue about 11 p.m., authorities said. The shooter is believed to have fled on foot, but no other details were available. Moran died after being taken to Western Medical Center-Anaheim, authorities said.

Joseph Patrick Cairns, whose heart condition led to his surrender on charges of grand theft from a Buena Park restaurant after 2 1/2 years on the run, died in custody Sunday at Western Medical Center-Anaheim, a Sheriff's Department spokesman said. The official cause of death will not be known until an autopsy can be conducted, but authorities said Cairns' death may have resulted from his previous heart condition.