Panel Finds Bias at Hospital but Declines to Act

Los Angeles County’s embattled Martin Luther King Jr. Hospital/Drew Medical Center was thrown into further turmoil Wednesday when the Civil Service Commission concluded that the hospital discriminates against non-blacks--including the former head of its emergency room--but declined to do anything about it.

Upholding what the former emergency room chief’s lawyer called a “devastating finding of racism,” the commission voted 4 to 0 to formally approve a tentative ruling it made in June. At that time, it upheld a hearing officer’s critical report that cited racism at the busy hospital and trauma center by some black administrators against non-blacks.

The panel voted down a request by the veteran emergency room physician who initiated the Civil Service proceedings, Dr. Subramaniam Balasubramaniam, that he be reinstated to his former position. Dr. Bala, as he is known, was acting head of the emergency medicine department, including the emergency room, from 1979 to 1986. He remains in the emergency room as an attending physician.

By sidestepping that issue, the commission set the stage for a long-brewing showdown between two warring factions--those doctors supporting Bala, and hospital administrators who have repeatedly overlooked Bala in favor of a series of other emergency medicine chiefs. In his Civil Service case, Bala said black hospital administrators repeatedly kept him from his former leadership role because he is Indian.

“They approved the report, but there is no remedy,” a disappointed Bala said of the commission members. “The discrimination can continue. And the crisis will continue.”

Now, he said, “Patient care has deteriorated significantly, teaching has gone downhill. It is like a chicken with its head cut off. We are drifting, without any leadership.”

But hospital administrators and Assistant Health Director Walter Gray said Wednesday that the emergency room is fine.

While acknowledging that problems exist, Gray said leadership in the emergency room is fully qualified and doing a good job.

King/Drew officials are awaiting word from Gray and other top health department administrators, who are trying to determine “potential remedies” in the Bala case, said Randall Foster, who assumed the title of chief operations officer at King/Drew this week as part of a crisis management team ordered by county supervisors.

As for the racism charges, Foster said: “Certainly a lot of this took place before our arrival and we are attempting to fact-find. We are conducting investigative and consultative reviews of everything, of any issues affecting patient care and quality of care.”

Bala and about half the emergency room’s dozen or so doctors outlined a host of concerns in a bluntly worded five-page letter sent Jan. 5 to county Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke, whose district includes the hospital.

In the letter, which has not been made public, they all but pleaded with Burke to intervene, saying hospital management and the county Department of Health Services have ignored festering problems at King/Drew, which was created after the Watts riots to serve the black community in South Los Angeles.

“We believe that there has been a failure of leadership which must be addressed if the larger problem is to be corrected,” the doctors wrote. They asked that Bala assume control over the emergency department and that Dr. Joanne Williams head the residency training program at the teaching hospital.

Bala said the letter was sent because of frustration over the Civil Service process, in which he and his lawyer have been rebuffed by years of delays and indecision by panel members. On Wednesday, Bala and lawyer Rees Lloyd said they had hoped the panel would reinstate him to his former post.

After their vote to endorse the hearing officers findings, Lloyd told the members that they had an obligation to reinstate Bala. Several commission members responded that they did not know enough details to meddle in the health department’s business.

“My fear is, what if there is someone else who is very qualified who is being discriminated against also?” asked commission member Leslie Gilbert-Lurie. “My fear is that we don’t necessarily know every fact, or that you are the person that needs to be in the position today.”

Panel members suggested that the health department appoint a committee to see who is qualified. Lloyd was opposed, saying the law allows the commission to right wrongs. “The law says if somebody has shown that they were discriminated against, then they get the job.”

Ultimately, commission members decided to “send the message” that Bala should be given an equal opportunity to be promoted to the position of chairman of emergency medicine.

Health officials said it was too early to comment Wednesday on exactly what kind of follow-up, if any, will occur in the Bala case.

Gray, assistant health director for hospitals, said Bala’s reinstatement is probably moot because the department is considering privatizing the emergency room. Gray said contracting out the entire department to a private medical group would give the county better control over doctors.

Many emergency room doctors are now under departmental investigation because of allegations of excessive moonlighting and other problems, according to investigators.

Bala has been fighting to regain his job for 10 years, since he was replaced in favor of a permanent director who was supposed to groom a black doctor to take over the emergency department. That doctor was later succeeded by Dr. Eugene Hardin, another black doctor, who hospital officials say is well qualified to run the department.

After hearing 12 days of testimony in Bala’s case, however, Civil Service hearing officer Terri Tucker concluded that the hospital and the affiliated Drew School of Medicine had an “unwritten policy of maintaining itself as a black institution and of placing black candidates in positions of leadership . . . to the exclusion of non-blacks.”

Hardin, who is the temporary head of the emergency department, did not return calls seeking comment.

While he waits for county officials to respond, Bala said he plans to continue to fight for reinstatement through several lawsuits he has filed in Los Angeles Superior Court. He said a majority of the emergency room doctors are supporting him. “So long as I have their support,” he said, “I will keep fighting.”