California Hospital News Roundup for the Week of August 22, 2008
Alameda Hospital will take over administration of South Shore Convalescent Hospital beginning on Sunday, the Alameda Journal reports.
Alameda Hospital owns the building housing the facility and in February, informed M. Carlson Inc. that it would take over operation of the facility. The facility has capacity for 26 residents (Hegarty, Alameda Journal, 8/19).
On Monday, Doctors Medical Center San Pablo's bankruptcy exit plan took effect, after receiving court approval last week, the East Bay Business Times reports.
Under the plan, the hospital will discharge about $12 million of its estimated $19 million in debt. Payments to creditors will be extended over four years (Hogarth, East Bay Business Times, 8/14).
A year after Los Angeles County supervisors voted to end inpatient services at Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital, county officials recognized that they would not meet their goal of reopening the facility within 18 months, the Los Angeles Times reports.
Supervisors voted to end inpatient services at King-Harbor after federal investigators concluded that the facility did not meet minimum standards for patient care.
Supervisors have been in talks with University of California officials about UC taking over management of the facility but an agreement has not been reached (Therolf, Los Angeles Times, 8/17).
On Monday, representatives of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee announced that they had reached a contract agreement with Sutter Health's Mills Peninsula Health Services, the East Bay Business Times reports (Hogarth, East Bay Business Times, 8/18).
Under the agreement, nurse salaries would increase by 13.5% over the first 10 months of the contract and a total of 17.5% over about three years, according to union officials (Rauber, San Francisco Business Times, 8/18).
A date has not been set for union members to vote on the contract (East Bay Business Times, 8/18).
On Aug. 8, Scripps Mercy Hospital officials submitted a correction plan to CMS for patient care violations that investigators said might have contributed to a patient death in February, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports.
A report by federal investigators identified five areas in which Scripps Mercy Hospital's Chula Vista and Hillcrest campuses were not meeting federal standards. If the problems are not addressed, the hospital could lose its eligibility to participate in Medicare or Medi-Cal, California's Medicaid program.
Hospital officials said that Scripps Mercy has resolved the issues or is working to correct them (Clark, San Diego Union-Tribune, 8/20).
UC-Davis Medical Center is seeking bids for a new parking garage for between 500 and 800 vehicles, the Sacramento Bee reports.
The project is slated to cost about $20 million, and construction is set to begin in 2010 (McIntosh, Sacramento Bee, 8/15).