Torrance Burn Center Denies It Will Close

A spokeswoman for Torrance Memorial Hospital Medical Center said Wednesday that the hospital is not planning to close its burn center.

The statement comes a day after Supervisor Deane Dana said he would ask his colleagues in a formal motion to heighten lobbying in Sacramento to raise funds to pay for treating uninsured burn patients. Dana said his concern stemmed from a memo from Robert Gates, county Department of Health Services director, that Torrance was considering closing its burn unit because of financial losses.

The memo makes the situation seem “more threatening than it really is,” said hospital spokeswoman Laurie Blue Lundberg on Wednesday, adding: “We are not planning to close.”

Lundberg said the burn center has provided $1 million in unpaid services since January and that the situation is worsening. She said the hospital has been talking to county and state officials about providing more money for the county’s three burn centers. Sherman Oaks Community Hospital and County-USC Medical Center are the other two.

In a motion that Dana said he plans to introduce in the Board of Supervisors meeting next week, he called the Torrance burn center “vital to our community . . . with (its) many industries and unforeseen accidents.”

Besides asking for more lobbying, the motion would have the county work with the Hospital Council of Southern California to increase public awareness of the problems that burn centers face.

Dana aide Don Knabe said the hospital “came to us with a problem, and we both want a solution.”

Lundberg said the burn center draws patients from as far away as Washington state and San Francisco. She said, however, that the hospital board is “watching this closely” to ensure that the burn unit’s financial problems “do not jeopardize other services.”

Concern about the burn center’s survival comes on the heels of an announcement by the hospital that it is changing its name--to Torrance Memorial Medical Center--and launching a $5-million fund drive to finance new facilities.