Layoff Notices Spread Pain at Area Hospitals

After months of ups and downs, rumor and recrimination, the bad news came in droves Friday, as nearly 900 county health workers in the San Fernando Valley area received layoff notices amid the county’s continuing budget woes.

The layoffs, effective Oct. 1, will reduce staff size at Olive View-UCLA Medical Center in Sylmar and High Desert Hospital in Lancaster by almost one-third--barring an infusion of aid from the state or federal government to bridge the county’s $655-million deficit.

At Olive View, 690 of about 2,200 employees received notices, while at High Desert, 152 of about 580 received pink slips. A total of 54 others were given notice at area clinics. About 190 workers were demoted.

“People are devastated. I am devastated,” said Melinda Anderson, Olive View’s administrator. “Because of the numbers, the impact is catastrophic. But even though we’re in the middle of a curtailment, people are still getting sick, and we have to collect ourselves so we can take care of them.”

The layoffs mean that outpatient services will be reduced by 75% beginning Oct. 1. On the same day, 28 of the county’s 39 clinics and health centers are scheduled to close.

Because union rules favor county employees who have the most seniority, layoffs will affect both inpatient and outpatient services, as well as employees at clinics and health centers--and everyone from doctors and nurses to receptionists and temporary workers.

All day Friday, doctors and nurses voiced concern that patients might delay or skip treatment if forced to pay for medical services or drive long distances. They talked about the possibility of a new outbreak of tuberculosis and of the sick going uncared for and dying.

“We already see diabetics who wait until they have wounds that are gangrenous,” said Tina Waller, an emergency-room nurse at Olive View who had just received her layoff notice. “And we already have so many people with TB. What’s going to happen if they are not seen? It will spread even more.”

Everywhere, the mood was taut with emotion. Security guards, hired just for the day, patrolled hospitals and milled around clinics. Doctors were put on shorter schedules to alleviate the stress. Employees were permitted to go home if they wished.

At the Mid-Valley Comprehensive Health Center in Van Nuys, as mothers streamed through the doors pushing strollers or pulling toddlers, grim-faced supervisors emerged from a meeting carrying stacks of large envelopes containing layoff notices.

Supervisors then met with each employee and a witness. The supervisor would read the letter, then hand the package to the worker.

At the area’s nine health clinics--five of which are also scheduled to close Oct. 1--workers’ reactions to the pink slips ranged from tearful outbursts to stony silence.

The Van Nuys center, which was badly damaged by the Northridge earthquake, now operates out of a group of trailers. Though it will be one of the county’s few clinics to remain open, the hard-luck center will offer only a few services, including prenatal care and family planning.

“We’ve been through the ringer,” said a weary Gretchen McGinley, the center’s chief operating officer. “We’ve been through the natural disaster, through the man-made disaster and I’m not sure which is easier.”

Waiting outside, Alicia Hardy, a prenatal clerk, stood behind one of the trailers at the earthquake-damaged clinic, smoking a cigarette.

Because she is a temporary employee, Hardy said she knew her fate and was simply biding her time. Temporary workers and county employees with less than three years of service had for weeks considered themselves doomed.

“I had to get out of there,” she said. “Everybody’s so depressed. You’d think a funeral was going on. . . . I haven’t smoked in a long time. I started again.”

Some expressed relief. After spending the summer listening to rumors and placing hopes in the county’s constantly changing plans, the layoff notices brought about, finally, some closure.

“It’s done, so now I can move on, decide whether to look for another job or go into private practice,” said Shung Cheung, a Canoga Park Health Center pediatrician who received a layoff notice.

As they waited, all wore an article of pink clothing to try to brighten the somber mood.

“I’ve got one pink slip already,” smiled nursing supervisor Maxine Falls, raising her dress. “I don’t want another one.”

Falls was lucky. She will not lose her job. Instead, she will be transferred to Olive View, which is a shorter drive from her Pacoima home.

Many of her friends did not fare as well.

“I expected it, but still, until you hear it, it doesn’t seem real,” said her colleague Marta Dwyer, a registered nurse who was laid off. “I’m going to be OK though.”

In some cases, patients seemed to be more disturbed than nurses and physicians.

“They can’t do this, how can they do this to you?” asked Caroline Greenwood, who brought her two sons in for vaccinations. When someone explained the county’s financial crunch to her, Greenwood realized that she would be affected by the layoffs and closures as well.

“We don’t have the use of a car, so I don’t know how we’ll get to Olive View, if that’s where we’ll have to go,” she said. “What happens to people like us who are too poor to go somewhere else?”

Greenwood received the same answer that other patients have been hearing from the staff: No one knows.

At High Desert Hospital in Lancaster on Friday morning, 10 religious leaders--Christian, Buddhist, Jewish and Hindu among them--wandered hallways, consoling grieving workers.

“We thought it was a good idea with all the craziness of the last few months,” said Bill Fujioka, the hospital’s director. “I think because of the ups and downs and the length of time this whole thing took, it has had a worse emotional impact on us.”

But as bad as things are, Fujioka said, the situation will only get worse if Sacramento and Washington fail to bail the county out.

“It’s not over yet,” he said.

Only clinics in Pacoima, Van Nuys and Glendale are scheduled to remain open after Oct. 1, but they will offer only public health services. A clinic in Lancaster is expected to expand its services to offset the cutbacks at High Desert.

Also, if the county fails to secure additional aid from Sacramento and Washington, it may have to close down at least one of its six hospitals. High Desert is second on the list, Olive View is third.

At Olive View, the $46.3-million cut was accomplished Friday by eliminating most outpatient services, pediatric intensive care and mental-health inpatient services.

The idea was to cut back on specialty services and focus instead on providing “general medical clinics that see the sickest patients,” said Carolyn Rhee, the hospital’s associate administrator.

The number of mental-health beds was reduced to 32 from 57, and all adolescent inpatient services were eliminated, she said.

In all, 44 full-time doctors at Olive View received pink slips. One was Martha Sosa, a 34-year-old internist who, due to a lack of seniority, knew she was a likely candidate.

Still, the layoff came at a bad time--she is getting married in two weeks. Her medical-school debts top $50,000.

Sosa, who was born in Mexico, speaks fluent Spanish and comes from a background not too different from some of the patients who crowd the waiting room. Her father came north to pick apples. Her mother worked in a laundry.

The Northridge resident started bandaging dolls at age 5. She was hired at Olive View in July of last year.

“She is exactly the kind of physician we look for,” said Rhee, adding that bilingual doctors are a rarity at Olive View.

Like most other laid-off employees, however, Sosa expressed concern only for the working poor who come to the hospital. “Mostly,” she said, “I worry about the patients.”

In turn, Blanca Barajas, who comes every three months for insulin, worries about Sosa.

“These doctors,” she said, “I love them. I don’t want to go nowhere else. I worry too much for my health, for me and all the other people here.”