Los Angeles hospital closes, laying off 638 employees, over earthquake standards
Hospital needed to invest $100 million in 150-year old building to come into compliance with California's seismic standards.
Pacific Alliance Medical Center, cited as the oldest hospital in Los Angeles, has closed, laying off all 638 employees.
The hospital of 128 acute-care beds provided care for more than 150 years. It closed on November 30, according to a hospital notice.
The hospital needed to retrofit its building to meet California's seismic standards, but said it did not own the land on which the facility sits and was unable to buy the real estate from the owner, according to the Los Angeles Business Journal.
It could not make a $100 million investment in a hospital on land it did not own, the report said.
Pacific Alliance Medical Center faced other financial issues, including a reported $17 million operating loss in the first half of the year.
In June, hospital executives agreed to pay $42 million to settle a whistleblower case that alleged compliance among some physicians to refer patients to the hospital, resulting in a charge of filing false Medicare claims.
Also this summer, the hospital said a ransomware attack had compromised the health information of more than 260,000 patients.
