King/Drew downsizing cost escalates
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County health officials Monday revised budget estimates of the cost of downsizing Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center, adding an additional 25% to the price tag over three years.
The total extra cost to the county jumped from a projected $65 million to $81 million. The overhaul of the Willowbrook hospital will cost $475 million to $500 million a year after specialty services and many employees are shifted to other county facilities. King/Drew’s current budget is about $440 million.
The main cost increase is the transfer of hospital employees to other county jobs, health chief Dr. Bruce Chernof wrote in a memo to county supervisors.
Chernof drafted a plan to cut King/Drew’s size and put it under another county hospital’s control after King/Drew failed a critical inspection earlier this year, jeopardizing $200 million in federal funds.
Harbor-UCLA Medical Center near Torrance will manage the smaller hospital, to be renamed Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Hospital.
Neonatal intensive care, pediatric intensive care and high-risk obstetric services are scheduled to relocate to Harbor-UCLA at the end of the month.
The adult psychiatric unit is to be moved to County-USC Medical Center Dec. 15.
susannah.rosenblatt@
latimes.com
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