Hospital Closure Seen as Causing Abortion Pinch

While county health officials on Thursday supervised the closure of Inglewood Women’s Hospital, some patients, doctors and family-planning specialists said the action could leave a void for women in advanced stages of pregnancy.

The state Department of Health Services on Wednesday ordered closure of the hospital, the state’s busiest abortion facility, which has been accused of providing inadequate care amid unsanitary conditions. The hospital’s operations have been suspended pending a hearing and final ruling on revocation of its license by state officials.

But Dr. Morton Barke, the hospital’s owner and chief of staff, planned to go to Los Angeles Superior Court today to seek an order that would permit the hospital to remain open. In addition, he said the facility’s eight doctors may continue to use the hospital under their licenses as private practitioners to perform abortions.

Some doctors and family-planning experts declined to comment on the quality of care at the hospital, which specializes in abortions, but they said they are concerned that the closure leaves only a handful of local facilities that perform abortions for women after the third month of pregnancy.

“It appears that the places that are able to do abortions are becoming fewer and fewer,” said Dr. Charles Ballard, head of gynecology at County-USC Medical Center.

Ballard said that cutbacks in government funding have restricted a number of elective procedures, such as abortions, that can be performed at public hospitals. He said that some other facilities have stopped performing abortions because of “harassment” by anti-abortion groups.

Health officials said they were unsure how many facilities are the scene of abortions on women who are in the second trimester of their pregnancies, but a national referral service said that only two of its member agencies in Los Angeles County perform such abortions.

Abortions are more dangerous during the second trimester, which extends from the 13th to 24th week of pregnancy. More than 90% of abortions nationally are done during the first trimester, said Jo Ellen Pasman, director of the California Abortion Rights Action League.

Doctors at San Vicente Hospital in the Fairfax area of Los Angeles perform second-trimester abortions. Hospital Administrator Wayne Ives said the facility has not noticed an increase in admissions since the state’s action against Inglewood Women’s Hospital. Another Inglewood abortion clinic that does not allow second-trimester procedures also reported no increase in admissions.

Inglewood Women’s Hospital reported 11,330 abortions in 1986, according to state health regulators, or nearly one-quarter of all abortions performed that year in California hospitals.

Barke said that more than half of the Inglewood hospital’s patients are impoverished women who use Medi-Cal to pay their bills. Only complicated procedures that require overnight care will be discontinued, Barke said.

Ralph Lopez, chief of the health facilities division of the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, said doctors can continue to perform abortions as long as they do not represent the facility as a hospital or keep patients for more than 24 hours. Health officials will keep the facility under close watch to make sure it does not overstep those guidelines, he said.

Controversy continued to swirl around the hospital Thursday.

Three county health officers observed treatment of the 21 patients who had begun their abortion procedures before the hospital was ordered to close. Four women had not had their operations completed by the end of the day and will be permitted to return to the hospital today, according to Lopez.

Susan Carpenter-McMillan, president of the California chapter of Feminists for Life, gripped a chain and padlock outside the one-story, 28-bed facility and asked that health officials close it for good. She accused the hospital of trying to evade the closure order and said that a member of the anti-abortion group had been able to schedule an appointment next week for an abortion despite the closure order.

Patients and family members milled around the hospital, located in a residential neighborhood at 426 E. 99th St., throughout the day Thursday.

Tonya Holley, 20, of West Los Angeles said she had been scheduled to undergo an abortion Thursday morning but changed her mind because of the controversy.

“I don’t even want to mess around with these people,” Holley said. “I won’t go here.” She said she came to the hospital only to have her Medi-Cal papers transferred to another facility.

Others said they were uneasy about the allegations but still had faith in the hospital.

“This is a place you come to erase a mistake,” said a Long Beach father who brought his 19-year-old daughter for an abortion. “It was immaculate in there. If I didn’t believe that, I wouldn’t have brought my daughter there.