California Healthline Rounds Up Coverage of Hospital News
California Healthline today rounds up coverage of recent hospital news from around the state. Summaries of the reports appear below.
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Stanford University Hospital and Clinics in the past two weeks has sent layoff notices to about 135 employees, spokesperson Emily Avila said, the San Jose Mercury News reports. The layoffs -- which include 60 nurses' assistant positions -- are part of an effort to free up funding to hire 100 new nurses next year to comply with required state nurse-to-patient ratios, according to Avila. Hospital officials have identified some employees who might voluntarily leave their positions and is offering severance packages, educational grants and job placement assistance to those who are laid off (Delevett, San Jose Mercury News, 9/4).
- San Diego-based Scripps Health is purchasing 4.19 acres of land adjacent to the Scripps Memorial Hospital in Encinitas in order to expand the facility, health system officials announced Wednesday, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports. Under terms of the sale, expected to be finalized this week, Scripps will pay $4.69 million to St. Mark Lutheran Church, the current owner of the property. The hospital has 140 inpatient and 12 emergency beds and is at capacity, according to Chris Van Gorder, president and CEO of Scripps Health (Neely, San Diego Union-Tribune, 9/4).
- The Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Redwood City will begin a 20- to 22-year redevelopment project that will triple the size of the campus after the Redwood City Council last week unanimously approved the plans, the San Mateo County Times reports. The plans call for the demolition of most of the existing buildings and will increase the facility's square footage from 330,000 to 960,000. The first of five construction phases could begin as early as this year (Jouvenal, San Mateo County Times, 8/26).
- Vista Hospital Systems on Sept. 15 will seek regulatory and legal approval of the sale of its Corona Regional Medical Center to Pennsylvania-based Universal Health Services, the Riverside Press-Enterprise reports. The sale is part of an effort by Vista -- which filed for bankruptcy protection in June -- to sell three hospitals in San Luis Obispo County to Universal for $120.6 million. Hospital officials support the sale, which they said would allow the facility to pay for upgrades to the emergency, obstetrics and intensive care departments. The hospital has put on hold a $17 million fundraising campaign for the improvements in light of the pending sale (Beeman, Riverside Press-Enterprise, 9/3).