CMS Issues 142 page Report After King-Harbor Hospital Survey

We regret to inform you that the most recent survey of Martin Luther King Jr. - Harbor Hospital has revealed that the hospital is not in compliance with a number of Medicare Conditions of Participation (CoPs)... We are therefore notifying you that the Medicare Provider agreement with the hospital will be terminated effective August 15, 2007.

So opens a 142 page report issued by CMS on August 10th, and addressed to Antoinette Epps, The Administrator of King-Harbor Hospital in Los Angeles. 

The August 11th LA Times reports:
Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital shut down its emergency room Friday night and will close entirely within two weeks, a startlingly swift reaction to a federal decision to revoke $200 million in annual funding because of ongoing lapses in care.

The extraordinary developments mark an end to nearly four years of failed attempts to reform the historic institution.

Comments

[Jen]

And the sad part about this is that my mother did the trauma part of her nurse's training there back in the late 1960's. She said she saw corruption and nursing/management incompetence even back then... "nurses" doing student training who hadn't even finished nursing school; the head of HR hiring unqualified people just because they were friends; people who had been fired from another local hospital for incompetence were hired there. It goes on and on.

Let's just hope that when they try and reopen King-Drew Medical Center in a year, it will be with a qualified, competent management and staff, with standards that are upheld.

It's a sorely needed hospital that just needed more support and attention than the County was willing and/or able to give them.

[Rita Schwab]

Thanks for your comment Jen. I agree, there are no winners in this mess.

Rita