L.A. County Makes Plans to End Patient ‘Dumping’

Responding to criticisms that county hospitals routinely leave discharged patients on skid row, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a plan to change the way it releases homeless patients from county-run facilities.

In a 4-1 vote with Supervisor Gloria Molina absent, the board ordered the health services, public social services, mental health and sheriff’s departments to report back in 30 days on protocols to ensure that homeless patients discharged from county-run hospitals have access to services.

Last week, the Los Angeles Police Department alleged that a number of private and public hospitals, along with several suburban law enforcement agencies, routinely “dump” homeless people, criminals and drug addicts on skid row in downtown Los Angeles.

The law enforcement agencies and hospitals denied that they dumped people downtown. But several of the hospitals, including Martin Luther King Jr./ Drew Medical Center, Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center and Kaiser Permanente West Los Angeles, acknowledged they routinely transport medically stable patients to skid row providers, because they say that is where most of the county’s social service providers are clustered.

County officials have acknowledged that County-USC Medical Center also transports discharged patients to skid row.

Supervisor Mike Antonovich condemned the discharge practices and offered a motion to end them.

“These actions are unacceptable and inappropriate,” Antonovich told fellow board members. “Action needs to be taken to establish collaboration between the public-private sector and county agencies in addressing this critical need.”

Antonovich’s motion also called for a pilot program that would assign Department of Public Social Services caseworkers to each county medical center to help homeless patients about to be discharged.

Although Tuesday’s board action will affect only public hospitals, Antonovich called on private medical centers to also address the issue. He said more needs to be done to spread homeless and mental health resources across the region.

Antonovich and Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke said officials need to establish a method of ensuring people on skid row are getting help for mental health problems. Antonovich said that could mean changing state law, which he said made it more difficult to commit mentally ill people who are not an immediate danger.