Funding Crisis May Close Poison Control Centers

Three of California’s seven regional poison control centers are facing closure over funding shortfalls resulting from the state’s budgetary woes and tight money in the health care system.

Poison centers in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Orange counties report crippling and potentially fatal money problems that already have forced them to reduce the number of phone lines, cut educational services and divert professional staff to fund raising. The Los Angeles center could close as early as the end of the year, officials said.

Two other centers--in Santa Clara and Fresno counties--also say that they are under financial pressure and have cut staff and services.

Collectively, the California poison centers--which operate 24-hour emergency telephone lines--give treatment advice for 250,000 victims of accidental poisoning a year, most of them under the age of 7. About 70% require no further medical attention, experts say, saving the health care system costly and unnecessary emergency room visits.

Nationally, the financial picture is also bleak--the worst since the network of about 100 regional poison centers formed in the early 1970s.

“We are doing terribly,” said Dr. Toby Litovitz, president of the American Assn. of Poison Control Centers. “There is virtually no poison center in the United States that is adequately funded right now.”

In California, the state Emergency Services Authority provides about 20% of the money needed to run the regional poison centers. This year, the centers shared in a 4% funding cut that resulted from a severe state revenue shortfall.

The centers get the rest of their operating funds from private sources and, in some cases, local government. For all seven regional centers, a disproportionate funding burden has fallen on the hospital, agency or county where the center is based, officials say.

The funding outlook at the San Diego regional poison center was not as bleak as in Los Angeles.

“The Los Angeles center has only two sources of funding--private support and the state,” said Anthony Manoguerra, director of the San Diego center. “We have a little more room to move around if a problem comes up.”

The San Diego center receives half of its $760,000 yearly operating budget from the UCSD Medical Center in Hillcrest where it is housed. County government provides an additional 14%. The rest is made up from private donations and the state.

“We have been able to absorb most of the (state) cutback with private funding,” Manoguerra said. “We were notified pretty well in advance, and we planned more fund-raising.

“We’re not under an immediate threat. But then again, the way the economy is, any one of our funding sources could change.”

Manoguerra said staffing and services will remain the same as last year, when 13 workers handled 60,000 cases where a poisoning occurred or callers were trying to prevent a poisoning.

The Los Angeles County Medical Assn. must raise $800,000 a year to meet the $1.2-million budget of the poison control center it operates for Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. Most of the donations have traditionally come from hospitals and medical professionals, but this year these have provided only a third of what is needed, according to Collette E. Wright, a medical association vice president. To save money last spring, the center cut the number of incoming public phone lines from six to four.

The medical association was to launch a public appeal today. Without broad-based community support and immediate donations, the center will be forced to close at the end of the year, Wright said.

In Orange County, the main funding source is the UC Irvine Medical Center, which operates the center serving Orange, San Bernardino, Riverside, Inyo and Mono counties. None of these counties contribute, nor do other hospitals in the region, according to Laurie Bunnel, the medical center’s associate director.

But UCI Medical Center is increasingly hard-pressed by the cost of treating Orange County’s poor and uninsured patients. Last spring, it nearly eliminated the poison center because of budgetary shortfalls. The same scenario next spring could lead to the center’s closure July 1 if other funding sources aren’t found, Bunnel said.

“We need some help,” she said.

Times staff writers John H. Lee and Lanie Jones contributed to this story.