Dateline:  Los Angeles, April 21, 2008

 

     Upset with the stories found in the printed media, community residents of South Los Angeles are planning to picket the Los Angeles Times Newspaper on Thursday April 24, at 11 AM... in what may be the beginning of the a series of rallies against the Los Angeles print media, for false or incomplete reporting. The residents of South Los Angeles are particularly upset by the series of LA Times article which preceded and were contributory to the ultimate closure of the hospital. While they reported the spectacular results of patients being detained in the hospital's Emergency Room for protracted periods of time, and even one patient dying without being seen, they failed to report the underlying causes for the hospital problems which were fiscal in nature.

 

     Instead the LA Times and other media focused upon the staff as being shiftless and lazy as being the problem. The LA Times failed to report that at times Martin Luther King Hospital has been ranked in the top 10% of hospitals nationwide for "save rates" involving patients  with severe traumatic injuries from gunshot wounds and auto accidents...etc. It was the designated hospital to which the president of the United States was to be treated if injured in the Los Angeles area. The surgeons for the United States Military trained at Martin Luther King hospital, which has long been eyed for a take over by neighboring UCLA hospital, because of the pathology, and volume of traumatic injuries, which are almost non-existent in upscale Westwood... but needed to train trauma surgeons. Now patients injured in Los Angeles are transported long distances to UCLA and other area trauma centers..... if they survive the ride! Cancer patient requiring radiation therapy must travel to Santa Monica, the nearest such hospital.

 

     Martin Luther King Hospital should not have closed. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors openly admit that they have no medical training and therefore were forced to rely upon healthcare consultants who were paid millions of dollars but gave poor advise. Most recently it was advised that the county should 11 county clinics, which if this had manifested... they county's healthcare system would have imploded upon itself as these patients made their way to the already overburdened hospital ERs within the county.

 

     Given the numbers of medically indigent patients seen at the hospital, it should have generated much income because of federal Tobacco money that has been earmarked for the treatment of indigent patients. Some neighboring private hospitals report that they are well paid for treating the indigent uninsured patients, because of these federal funds, which far surpass the reimbursement paid by the states Medicaid Program, which in California is called "Medi-Cal". The reimbursement through Medi-Cal is so poor that most physicians cannot afford to see any significant number of Medi-Cal patients. The Medi-Cal program is heavily subsidized by the federal government.... and so it is unclear as to the reason that California ranks approximately 50th and is at the bottom all states for reimbursement. In past years Los Angeles County nearly lost it's federal funding when it was discovered that Medi-Cal allocations sent to the county.... were being used for "administrative costs" whose connection with health care delivery could not be explained.

 

    Poor reimbursement from the state was not the only cause for the fiscal woes of the hospital. The number one problem that led to the closure of the hospital, which even the U.S. government depended upon for the training of it's trauma surgeons... was because of disproportionate cuts in funding to Martin Luther King hospital

by Los Angeles County officials. Los Angeles county Director of the Health Services department Bruce Chernoff recently resigned under fire after a breakdown in discussions to reopen the hospital failed with Pacific Hospital in Long Beach, after the ability of this very financially successful small hospital was questioned.

 

     Reopening the hospital is doomed for failure, unless the underlying problem of patient congestion is relieved, by establishing a network of strategically placed well equipped, well staffed urgent care centers.

Dr. Smith opened the first urgent care center in Los Angeles in 1983, the Baldwin Hills Medical, which was visited by physicians across the city for months after it's opening. Urgent care centers fell into disfavor because of poor reimbursement rates by insurance companies the tone for which was set by the State of California's poor reimbursement....which was so bad that the state's own hospital UCLA will accept Medi-Cal only under certain limited circumstances.  State senator Mark Ridley Thomas supported the closure of the hospital. Now he has based his platform to be elected as a County Supervisor, upon the need.... and his dedication to re-open the hospital... after he investigates the causes for the closure. When faced with the question of why didn't he investigate the reasons for closure prior to his public endorsement of hospital's closure his only related response has been...."that was then.....this is now" !!!

 

    The rally scheduled for Thursday April 21, 2008 will put other area newspapers on notice that they may be next for such protest if the news blackouts, of matters which impact upon our community persist...."as our people perish for lack of knowledge".

 

Delaney Smith Jr.,Pharm.D.,M.D.

Former Medical Writer for Los Angeles Sentinel Newspaper

Candidate For County Supervisor in Los Angeles -Second District

SAVE THE DATE!

May 18, 2008 

All Candidates Debate Forum
Time:  3 p.m. to 5 p.m.
Location:  To Be Announced
Sponsor:  Catholic African American Archdiocese

  * * *

June 3, 2008 

June 3rd Election
Tell Your Neighbors
"Vote For Change or Expect the Same"