Interim Hospital AIDS Unit Sought

Now that Los Angeles County officials have acceded to requests to build an AIDS ward at County-USC Medical Center, attention turned Friday to whether AIDS patients in the meantime should be “congregated” in existing wards in the hospital.

AIDS activists, demonstrating outside the county health department headquarters in downtown Los Angeles, argued that patients would receive better care if they were housed together. They accused county health officials of flouting an order by the Board of Supervisors to set up an interim AIDS ward at County-USC.

Health and hospital officials countered that AIDS patients are better off as they are--many of them assigned to wards with special equipment suited to their needs. They said the activists’ demands are unreasonable in a hospital consistently filled to overflowing.

There are currently 51 patients with AIDS and AIDS-related disease in the hospital.

‘Lot of Flak’

“I think there’s a lot of flak for 51 patients, many of whom require specialized isolation or services they are currently receiving,” said Dr. Sol Bernstein, medical director of the hospital.

“I think the public really needs to know that there are 1,450 patients there, and patients that are every bit as sick or sicker and require a lot of care, attention and effort,” Bernstein added. “We’re doing everything we can to improve the care of AIDS patients.”

The county is building a 20-bed AIDS ward at the giant, public hospital, which would mean that many acquired immune deficiency syndrome patients would still be housed in other wards. Until the ward’s opening, scheduled for September, patients with AIDS and AIDS-related diseases are scattered throughout the hospital in many different wards.

More than half a dozen are housed in the respiratory services ward because they require equipment like respirators. Others are in the intensive-care unit, officials said. Still others are in the communicable-diseases ward because they require isolation.

General Wards

County officials said the remainder, between 20 and 30, are housed in six or seven general wards. Robert Frangenberg, head of AIDS programs for the Department of Health Services, said those housing patterns amount to some “ de facto congregation.”

Members of ACT-UP Los Angeles, a militant AIDS activist group, would like to see all patients not requiring special services in a single ward. Such an arrangement would improve care, save money and offer a more supportive environment for patients, they say.

They point to a Feb. 21 motion by the supervisors requiring that the health department find an area for AIDS patients “and thereafter bring together in that area within 60 days the maximum number of AIDS and ARC patients for whom this configuration will be medically appropriate.”

“As of this time, 60 days have been up, and no beds have been congregated,” said Michaeljohn Horne of ACT-UP. “The reason that we’re upset is because it has been proven in other cities that congregating beds saves money and improves the well-being of patients.”

Frangenberg said the department has prepared a response to the supervisors’ motion explaining why an interim ward is unfeasible and not in patients’ interests. He said the hospital is so crowded that it is impossible to reserve a block of beds for AIDS patients.

Lack of Flexibility

“When you’re dealing with 105% capacity, you don’t have a lot of flexibility,” he said. “If you designate five beds (for AIDS patients) in one of the wards, what do you do--leave the leukemia patient down in the (admission area awaiting placement)?”

During their demonstration outside the health department, ACT-UP members called for the resignation of director Robert Gates and others. Earlier, the building had been splattered with red paint and graffiti protesting treatment of AIDS patients.

Horne said the group was not responsible for the graffiti and does not endorse its use.