Health Care District May Take Control of Hospital : Camarillo: An eminent domain action would put a proposed merger of two medical centers on hold.

Responding to community pressure, Camarillo Health Care District officials have decided to consider seizing control of Pleasant Valley Hospital to stall its proposed merger with St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard.

“As elected officials, it’s our obligation to look into all possibilities--that’s one of them,” district board member Dr. Gerard Karpman said Thursday. “We want to respond to the wishes of the public.”

District officials agreed to hire independent auditors to review Pleasant Valley Hospital’s financial records and look into acquiring the hospital by eminent domain. The decision came after nearly 250 Camarillo residents and physicians called for action at a public forum Wednesday.

District board members also decided to call a joint meeting with the Pleasant Valley Hospital board of directors to relay the community’s fears about losing the only hospital in Camarillo.

The five-member district board, which serves about 75,000 people in Camarillo, Somis and the Santa Rosa Valley, was formed in 1969 to build and operate Pleasant Valley Hospital. The district ran the hospital from its opening in 1974 to 1983, when district officials transferred it to a nonprofit corporation.

As a public agency with an elected board, the district has the authority to acquire the hospital by eminent domain, according to state law.

Sherry Williams, the district’s executive director, said the district does not have the money needed to purchase the hospital at fair market value. “I don’t know where we would get it,” Williams said.

District board member Gary Norris said residents could pay tax assessments or pass a bond issue so that the district could acquire the hospital, which was appraised at $22.5 million in 1989, according to hospital officials.

“There seemed to be a strong sentiment from those at the public forum that they would support that, but that was just one meeting,” Norris said.

Sheryl Rudie, planning director for Pleasant Valley Hospital, said the takeover would just shift the hospital’s financial problems to another entity. “They basically would be in the same position we are,” Rudie said.

Although the hospital made a $1-million profit last year, it shows a $586,000 deficit this fiscal year, said Norman Gruber, the hospital’s president. He said the decline in profit stems from a shrinking number of patients and from a growing number of patients who use Medicare.

Gruber said the hospital loses $600 a day on each Medicare patient because the federal government has reduced its reimbursements to a fixed amount regardless of the medical services received.

Many Camarillo residents and hospital physicians said they do not trust the contentions of hospital officials. They have accused hospital administrators of mismanagement. They said administrators have refused to provide the public with all the facts behind the merger.

Gruber has denied the charges of mismanagement and secrecy. “We have done nothing illegal,” he said.

Residents told district officials that hospital employees are worried about their jobs and believe that their futures are uncertain. Despite reassurances by hospital administrators, residents said they fear that they eventually will lose their hospital in the consolidation.

“We don’t have a lot of faith the community will be protected,” resident Charles Honn said.

Administrators from St. John’s and Pleasant Valley hospitals continued to argue this week that the merger is needed to ensure the long-term viability of Camarillo’s community hospital.

Pleasant Valley Hospital is projected to have a deficit of $3.5 million to $4 million by 1996, Gruber told Camarillo City Council members Wednesday. “We are a business and must function like a business,” Gruber said.

But residents at the forum reminded district board members that the hospital’s business is caring for the ill.

A feasibility study of the merger that Gruber released Wednesday shows that the number of staff positions and beds will be cut in coming years. Gruber has acknowledged only that layoffs are a possibility.

The projected cutbacks mean that the hospital will have fewer staff to serve each patient, according to the study, conducted by Medical Pathways Management Corp. of Torrance.

The study showed that the 441 beds now at the two hospitals would be reduced to 390. Pleasant Valley officials have said that 50% of their beds often are empty, and that the merger would increase the occupancy to almost full capacity.

Under the merger, the number of staff members serving each regularly admitted patient would decrease from 4.93 this year to 4.53 in 1996, the study says.

If the merger takes place, 23 full-time nursing positions will be cut by 1993, and 13 more by 1995, the study says.

Rudie said the drop in nurses stems from a trend in the health care industry. Patients are staying in hospitals less often and when they do check in, they stay for fewer days, she said.

The study also shows projected declines in the number of administrative and support staff in coming years. Rudie said the losses would probably come through attrition rather than layoffs.

The number of other administrative hospital jobs would fall from 531 in 1992 to 461 in 1995, the study said.

“Greater efficiencies occur as part of consolidation,” Rudie said. For example, she said, the hospitals would no longer need two billing, purchasing or computer departments.

Also under the merger, lab positions for diagnostic testing, such as radiology and cardiology, would decline from 469 in 1992 to 458 in 1996, the study said.

The merger must be approved by the Federal Trade Commission before becoming final, a process that could take six months or more, Gruber said.