California Hospital News Roundup for the Week of January 29, 2010
Children's Hospital Oakland
UnitedHealthcare announced that it has extended a partnership to keep Children's Hospital Oakland in its San Francisco Bay area network, the San Francisco Business Times reports.
The deal allows UHC members to continue obtaining in-network care from the hospital (Rauber, San Francisco Business Times, 1/19).
Children's Hospital Orange County
The state Department of Public Health is investigating Children's Hospital of Orange County after the hospital reported that a surgeon operated on the wrong part of a child's body on Jan. 19, the third such incident in four years, the Orange County Register reports.
A statement released by the hospital said that the surgery took place at St. Joseph Hospital, where all of CHOC's outpatient surgeries are done (Perkes, Orange County Register, 1/22).
Shasta Regional Medical Center, Redding
On Jan. 14, technical employees at Shasta Regional Medical Center voted to decertify the United Public Employees of California as their union, the Redding Record Searchlight reports.
The union had represented technicians, including laboratory and pharmacy technicians, for about 12 years, and the union will not contest the results, UPEC's senior labor relations representative Steve Allen said.
Hospital spokesperson Karen Hoyt said the Service Employees International Union is now the only bargaining unit at the hospital, representing about 100 of the facility's 680 employees (Benda, Redding Record Searchlight, 1/25).
Simi Valley Hospital
On Jan. 20, the Simi Valley Planning Commission approved a 203-space parking lot at Simi Valley Hospital by a 4-0 vote, with one abstention, the Ventura County Star reports.
Final approval for the project is needed from the Simi Valley City Council.
In addition, the planning commission eliminated the operation expiration date on a helicopter landing pad at the hospital, as no complaints have been made regarding helicopter flights since the permit was granted in 1989 (Willer-Allred, Ventura County Star, 1/21).
Tri-City Medical Center, Oceanside
On Jan. 20, the Tri-City Healthcare District's board voted unanimously to refinance the Tri-City Medical Center's $58.2 million debt with an interest-only bridge loan via CapitalSource Bank, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports.
Larry Anderson, the hospital's president and CEO, said the new loan will carry an interest rate of 4% and will require the hospital district to place its entire $51 million in reserves in an account with CapitalSource (Burge, San Diego Union-Tribune, 1/24).
UC-Irvine Medical Center
A CMS inspection in October 2009 found medication errors, breaches of patient privacy and a long delay in treatment for a patient's potentially life-threatening heart condition, according to a federal report released Jan. 21 by the hospital, the Los Angeles Times reports (Hennessy-Fiske, Los Angeles Times, 1/22).
UCI has since submitted a correction plan to Medicare, detailing proposals to retrain staff, undertake ongoing audits and adopt new procedures (Perkes, Orange County Register, 1/21).
UC-San Francisco
UC-San Francisco must raise an additional $250 million by mid-November for its planned Mission Bay women's, children's and cancer hospital, the Business Times reports.
UCSF Chancellor Susan Desmond-Hellman said $225 million has been raised so far. She said the hospital is expected to cost about $1.6 billion (Rauber, San Francisco Business Times, 1/22).
ValleyCare Medical Center, Pleasanton
On Jan. 19, ValleyCare Medical Center opened the One West Wing, a 24-bed, $10 million wing with private rooms for medical and surgical patients, officials with ValleyCare Health System said in a statement, the Business Times reports.
ValleyCare now has 242 licensed beds within its three-campus system, including 167 at the medical center (Rauber, San Francisco Business Times, 1/25).
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