Hearings on Sale of 4 Hospitals Start Today

Concern over the sale of four privately owned Orange County hospitals, including one of the county’s three trauma centers, will be discussed at a pair of unusual public hearings.

The state Senate Health Committee will take testimony from noon to 3 p.m. today at the Anaheim City Council chambers, and the Board of Supervisors will hold a hearing at 1 p.m. Tuesday in Santa Ana.

The hospitals are being sold by Tenet Healthcare Corp. of Costa Mesa to Integrated Healthcare Holdings Inc. of Costa Mesa. The buyers’ largest single investor is Hemet surgeon Dr. Kali P. Chaudhuri, who bought and then sought bankruptcy protection for a chain of medical clinics in 2000, closing 38 clinics that served tens of thousands of patients across Southern California -- including 56,000 in Orange County.

Three of the four hospitals for sale -- Western Medical Center-Santa Ana, Western Medical Center-Anaheim and Coastal Communities Hospital in Santa Ana -- are part of Orange County’s indigent care network. The fourth is Chapman Medical Center in Orange.

Sen. Joe Dunn (D-Santa Ana) said public dissection of a private business transaction was warranted because of the importance of the trauma center at Western Medical Center-Santa Ana.

The state Department of Health Services must decide by Jan. 31 whether to license the hospitals through the new owners.

“We’re not aware of any other situation where an investor left 300,000 patients without medical care,” Dunn said.

County supervisors Chairman Bill Campbell said that although the county had no oversight in the sale, officials wanted to examine it and forward their concerns to state regulators.

“These hospitals are an important part of the delivery of health care in the county,” Campbell said.

“The people we represent use and need these hospitals.”