COUNTYWIDE : Report Raps Trauma Center Cost Shifting

When accident victims with private insurance are treated at one of the county’s trauma centers, their payments not only cover their medical bills but also a significant portion of uninsured patients’ bills, a local coalition of business and health groups reported Tuesday.

Uninsured patients and those on MediCare or MediCal paid only 65% of their bills in 1989. Private insurance companies are picking up most of the difference, which amounted to $11.3 million that year, according to the report prepared for Trauma 2000.

Still, the county’s four trauma centers were left with an 11% deficit totaling $5.3 million, the report said.

The consultants who prepared the report argue that “cost shifting” must be reversed if trauma centers--high-tech emergency centers with neurosurgeons and other specialists standing by to save gunshot and traffic victims--are to stay open.

Trauma 2000 supports an effort by state Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi to create a low-cost, no-fault auto insurance to cover the high cost of trauma care.

Confidential data from Orange County’s four trauma centers in 1989 was used for the study. That year, UCI Medical Center, Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, Fountain Valley Regional Hospital and Medical Center and Mission Hospital Regional Medical Center in Mission Viejo all ran trauma centers. Fountain Valley’s trauma center has since closed.