Budget Deficits May Force Closure of Only Hospital on Catalina : Avalon: The 12-bed facility totaled losses of $2.2 million since 1984. Some residents oppose an idea to replace it with a ‘super-clinic.’

Huge budget deficits may force Avalon officials to close the only hospital on Santa Catalina Island by the end of the year, officials report.

The tiny 30-year-old hospital is running $338,000 a year in the red. Tentative plans under consideration would replace the hospital with a “super-clinic” to provide islanders and tourists with emergency treatment and outpatient care, officials said.

“A super-clinic would provide a high level of outpatient services and could be (financially) self-sustaining within three years,” Avalon City Manager Chuck Prince said. “The disadvantage is that we’d have to give up acute care. There would be no inpatient services or skilled nursing or convalescent care.”

A million tourists a year visit Catalina, a privately owned resort island 25 miles off the Los Angeles coast. Avalon, the only city on the island, has operated a small hospital for nearly a half century.

The 12-bed hospital is equipped and staffed to care for emergency and chronic patients, and has four beds set aside for long-term nursing care. The average occupancy is under two patients a day, Prince said.

The facility is operated by Long Beach Memorial Hospital under contract with the city.

“Long Beach (Memorial) has lost $2.2 million operating our hospital since 1984,” Prince said. The hospital has notified Avalon that it will not renew the operating contract when it expires at the end of the year.

At the request of Avalon officials, Long Beach hired a consultant to explore ways to provide the island with emergency medical services. The super-clinic idea is being evaluated but is proving to be unpopular with many island residents.

“Most of us want to keep the hospital,” longtime resident Jim Trout, 90, said. Trout, a widower, said his wife was cared for in the tiny hospital during her final illness. Older island residents need such care, he said.

The City Council, which also sits on the hospital advisory board, is trying to find alternative sources of money to keep the hospital open, but officials are not optimistic.

“We’d have to come up with a large amount of money each year,” said City Councilwoman Barbara Doutt, who chairs the hospital board. That could mean raising taxes or finding outside funding, neither of which appears promising at this point.