A Willowbrook hospital that serves a community with limited medical emergency facilities may have to close down as it faces a multi-million-dollar funding gap.
Martin Luther King Jr. Community Hospital was built to serve 25,000 patients a year. In the past year, however, it’s seen five times that number, according to one of its leaders.
“We are just bursting at the seams,” Dr. Atul Nakhasi, Vice President of Government and Community Affairs for the hospital, said.
While the hospital and its staff does its best to treat their community, it’s operating with more patients than beds they can accommodate.
“So, we are facing an $80 to $100 million funding gap starting next year,” Nakhasi said.
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors is expected to vote on Tuesday on whether to conduct an independent review of $126 million that goes to 13 hospitals every year. Nakhasi said he and his colleagues want that review since they believe it will show their hospital is one of the facilities that needs funding the most.
“If we don’t make the best use of all the public dollars at the local and state level, and it’s not going to where its most needed, unfortunately, we will see hospitals close,” Nakhasi said.
Health care employees are expected to rally at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday in front of the Hall of Administration in downtown Los Angeles ahead of the county supervisors’ meeting.