Hospitalization and homelessness

Re “L.A. files patient ‘dumping’ charges,” Nov. 16

I’m not at all surprised by the patient “dumping” stories. This has been going on for years. Nonpublic hospitals regularly release patients who lack health insurance before they are ready, or don’t admit them to the hospital when they should. As a staff physician at a free clinic, I frequently see patients who were either released from the hospital too early or not admitted when they should have been. What we should be looking at is not that these patients get a free ride to the shelter, but that they weren’t cared for appropriately in the first place.

If uninsured people arrive at an emergency room, it is the law that they be evaluated by a clinician, and if unstable, the hospital is required to treat them. However, once stable, maybe after a few days, they are discharged with a copy of the available free clinics to go to for follow-up. They often don’t get any medications because they can’t afford them. Hospitals and physicians don’t get paid to take care of the uninsured.

I don’t think we should lynch hospitals for providing transportation to shelters after not appropriately caring for these patients. Fix the root problem. Give health insurance to everyone who can’t afford it, and trust me, hospitals will take care of everyone who passes through their doors.

SUSAN PARTOVI MD

Santa Monica

The writer is the medical director for Homeless Health Care Los Angeles, a staff physician at the Venice Family Clinic and an assistant professor at the UCLA School of Medicine.

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What is L.A. City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo thinking, filing charges against Kaiser Permanente? Kaiser is a hospital, not a hotel. It is Kaiser’s responsibility to treat and eventually discharge its patients. Like many area hospitals, Kaiser generously offers discharged patients a free taxi ride home if they do not have someone who can pick them up. It is not Kaiser’s responsibility to indefinitely furnish housing for the homeless.

SIVA AYYAR MD

Studio City