Orange County Register: 20,000 may lose hospital coverage

[question everything]

Friday, July 15, 2005

20,000 may lose hospital coverage

UCI Medical Center tells CalOPTIMA that it won't be a service provider for MediCal patients.

By BERNARD J. WOLFSON
The Orange County Register

Up to 20,000 low-income residents of Orange County may lose insurance coverage for services at UCI Medical Center after the hospital's decision to withdraw from the MediCal program at the end of this year. UCI notified CalOPTIMA, which runs MediCal in Orange County, that after Dec. 31 it will no longer be a primary provider of hospital services for the agency. It cited "growing financial losses'' from its participation.

The university's hospital in Orange, along with two affiliated doctors clinics in Anaheim and Santa Ana, is one of 11 health networks in CalOPTIMA's managed-care system, which serves about two- thirds of the county's 300,000 MediCal recipients. The UCI network provides care to about 20,000 participants in the MediCal program. The hospital's decision also affects about 1,900 patients in the Healthy Families program for children, which CalOPTIMA runs.

(snip)

Kenneth Bell, CalOPTIMA's chief medical officer, acknowledged the agency's financial problems. "I don't know of any public health-care agency that is not underfunded," he said. "But CalOPTIMA is noted for having the lowest administrative cost of any health-care agency in the state. And the reality is we are always trying to make sure that the money we do spend gets the best care for our patients."

(snip)

"Losing 10, 11, 12 million dollars is a significant hole one has to fill," he said. Overall, UCI still posted a profit of $42 million last year, and $33 million in 2003. But Cygan said that a recent change in the way California hospitals are paid for providing care to the poor is creating new financial uncertainty.

(snip)

http://www.ocregister.com/ocr/2005/07/15/sections/business/business/article_597934.php

[elehhhhna]

1. Svarrtzy should point out that this will ease the Nursing shortage.

[getmeouttahere]

2. Let's see, do we provide health care for the poor...

or make only $30 million in profits instead of $42 million?

It's bad enough that most corporate decisions are based on what impact it will have on the shareholders instead of the customers and employees. But this nonsense has no business in health care. Will this country ever acknowledge that health care is a right, not a privilege? I seriously doubt it!