Community Psychiatric Centers Reports Loss : Health care: The Laguna Hills-based hospital chain is also preparing to close or sell some of its facilities and cut its work force.

Community Psychiatric Centers, preparing to close or sell some of its psychiatric hospitals and cut as much as 10% of its work force, said Thursday that it posted a loss of $37.9 million for its latest fiscal quarter.

The psychiatric hospital chain, which has 53 facilities worldwide, last month warned investors to expect the red ink, the bulk of which results from writing off the cost of severance packages and assets as part of the restructuring of an unspecified number of hospital facilities.

The loss, equal to 88 cents a share, contrasts with a profit of $6.9 million, or 15 cents a share, for the same period a year earlier. Revenue for the company’s first quarter, which ended Feb. 28, rose slightly to $84.7 million from $84.5 million.

Over the past few years, the company’s psychiatric hospitals have suffered as insurers have reined in health care costs by limiting a patient’s length of stay. Even though overall admissions rose during the latest quarter, the average length of time a patient stayed fell to 17.3 days, compared to 18 days in the same quarter a year earlier. That left some facilities overstaffed.

In Orange County, the company has hospitals in Santa Ana, Brea and Laguna Hills. Together, they have about 205 full-time employees.

The company would not say how many or which of its hospitals it plans to close or sell. Chairman and Chief Executive Richard L. Conte said the hospitals affected will be those with which “we can no longer be competitive.” He cited changing demographics of the marketplace, proliferation of local competition and the pressures of managed-care pricing wars as factors in deciding which facilities to close.

Meanwhile, the company has started to trim its overall staff of 4,000 full-time employees, including about a dozen from its corporate headquarters in Laguna Hills. A total of 200 to 400 employees could be laid off when the reductions are completed, probably in the next month, spokeswoman Suzanne S. Hovdey said. Additional layoffs could follow once the hospitals are sold or closed.

Even without the restructuring charge, the company would have posted a quarterly loss of $3 million, or 7 cents a share.

“Management will now be able to concentrate fully on the hospitals that are best positioned to survive in the industry shakeout,” Conte said. The company estimated that the budget trimming could save $20 million a year.

The operating loss was blamed on higher staffing expenses and costs to start up two new transitional-care facilities. Its subsidiary, Transitional Hospitals Corp., recently bought two hospitals that are intended to house patients who are discharged from intensive care units at general hospitals, which have greater overhead.