Los Angeles County Department of Health Services (abbreviated DHS and LADHS) operates the public hospitals and clinics in

Los Angeles County Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles, and sometimes abbreviated as L.A. County, is the List of the most populous counties in the United States, most populous county in the United States and in the U.S. state of California, ...

, and is the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

' second largest municipal

health system Health, according to the World Health Organization, is "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity".World Health Organization. (2006)''Constitution of the World Health Organi ...

, after

NYC Health + Hospitals NYC Health + Hospitals, officially the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation (HHC), operates the public hospitals and clinics in New York City as a public benefit corporation. , HHC is the largest municipal healthcare system in the Un ...

. DHS operates an extensive healthcare network throughout

, including three teaching and research hospitals affiliated with the

Keck School of Medicine of USC The Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California teaches and trains physicians, biomedical scientists and other healthcare professionals, conducts medical research, and treats patients. Founded in 1885, it is the second oldest ...

and Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, Rancho Los Amigos Rehabilitation hospital, and numerous outpatient clinics, including two

ambulatory care Ambulatory care or outpatient care is medical care provided on an outpatient basis, including diagnosis, observation, consultation, treatment, intervention, and rehabilitation services. This care can include advanced medical technology and proce ...

centers and 16 local health clinics. DHS also runs the

My Health LA My Health LA (abbreviated MHLA) is a no-cost health care program for low-income Los Angeles County residents, designed to benefit between 400,000 and 700,000 LA County residents who are ineligible for Medi-Cal, most of those being undocumented i ...

health care program, which benefits approximately 150,000 residents, in partnership with over 200 community partners. DHS' administrative headquarters is located in

Downtown Los Angeles Downtown Los Angeles (DTLA) contains the central business district of Los Angeles. In addition, it contains a diverse residential area of some 85,000 people, and covers . A 2013 study found that the district is home to over 500,000 jobs. It is a ...

Civic Center A civic center or civic centre is a prominent land area within a community that is constructed to be its focal point or center. It usually contains one or more dominant public buildings, which may also include a government building. Recently, the ...

, at the corner of

Figueroa Figueroa ( gl, Figueiroa) is a Spanish surname of Galicians, Galician origin. Notable people with the surname include: *Álvaro de Figueroa, 1st Count of Romanones (1863–1950), Spanish politician, Prime Minister (1912-1918) *Amon Tobin (1972– ...

and Temple Streets. DHS provided healthcare services to over 643,856 unique patients and 2,457,174 patient visits in Fiscal Year 2015–16. For Fiscal Year 2015–16, LADHS had an annual budget of . The County funds less than 15% () of LADHS' total annual budget.

History

Los Angeles County Department of Health Services Administration Building

Municipal governments, under Section 17000 of California's

Welfare and Institutions Code The California Codes are 29 legal codes enacted by the California State Legislature, which together form the general statutory law of California. The official Codes are maintained by the California Office of Legislative Counsel for the Legislature. ...

, are responsible as

safety net A safety net is a net to protect people from injury after falling from heights by limiting the distance they fall, and deflecting to dissipate the impact energy. The term also refers to devices for arresting falling or flying objects for the ...

health care providers. In the 1860s, Los Angeles County appointed a County Physician, and a small hospital for the poor in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...

was established. The Department of Charities was formed in 1913 and included five Divisions: County Hospital, County Farm, Outdoor Relief, Olive View Sanatorium, and Cemetery Divisions. The wide range of responsibilities of the Department of Charities eventually proved unwieldy, and in 1966 the department was split into the Departments of Hospitals and Public Social Services. Several institutions were acquired or established, including Rancho Los Amigos Poor Farm (now

Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center is a rehabilitation hospital located in Downey, California, United States. Its name in Spanish means 'Friends' Ranch'. History Overview Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center, or Ranc ...

) in 1890, the General Hospital (now

LAC+USC Medical Center Lac is the resinous secretion of a number of species of lac insects, of which the most commonly cultivated is '' Kerria lacca''. Cultivation begins when a farmer gets a stick that contains eggs ready to hatch and ties it to the tree to be infe ...

) in 1932, two military hospitals, including the Harbor General Hospital (now Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, after

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, Olive View Sanatorium (now

Olive View-UCLA Medical Center The olive, botanical name ''Olea europaea'', meaning 'European olive' in Latin, is a species of small tree or shrub in the family Oleaceae, found traditionally in the Mediterranean Basin. When in shrub form, it is known as ''Olea europaea'' 'M ...

) in 1970, and the Martin Luther King Medical Center (now Martin Luther King, Jr. Outpatient Center) in 1972, in response to the Watts Riots In the 1960s, the Los Angeles City Health Department merged into the county's Department of Health. In 1972, the Los Angeles County Departments of Hospitals and Health, along with the Los Angeles County Veterinarian's Office, were merged into the Department of Health Services, to consolidate and integrate health services. On May 30, 2006, the

Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors (LACBOS) is the five-member governing body of Los Angeles County, California, United States. History On April 1, 1850 the citizens of Los Angeles elected a three-man Court of Sessions as their firs ...

tentatively approved the establishment of

Los Angeles County Department of Public Health The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (DPH) provides public health services to Los Angeles County residents. Barbara Ferrer is the Director for the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health. Muntu Davis, MD, MPH is the Los Angel ...

(DPH) as a separate department, primarily to buffer DPH from DHS' recurring budget shortfalls and to separate

public health Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...

functions, including enforcement of laws, from DHS. DPH was formally established on July 7, 2006. The department was formally separated on July 6, 2006. On January 3, 2011,

Mitchell H. Katz Mitchell H. Katz (born December 29, 1959) also known as Mitch Katz) is the President and CEO of New York City Health and Hospitals, the largest public health care system in the United States. Early life and education Katz was raised in Brookly ...

, a physician, was appointed Director of Health Services for DHS. Katz served 13 years as director of public health for the San Francisco Department of Public Health, where he designed and implemented the "

Healthy San Francisco Healthy San Francisco is a health access program launched in 2007 to subsidize medical care for uninsured residents of San Francisco, California. The program's stated objective is to bring universal health care to the city. From 2008 to 2011, John F. Schunhoff, Ph.D. served as an interim director following Bruce Chernoff's resignation in May 2008. In 2011, DHS began enrolling hundreds of thousands of uninsured LA County residents in a publicly funded health program called Healthy Way LA (HWLA) and began a major overhaul of its health care system to increase emphasis on

primary care Primary care is the day-to-day healthcare given by a health care provider. Typically this provider acts as the first contact and principal point of continuing care for patients within a healthcare system, and coordinates other specialist care ...

instead of acute care. These reforms are set to take place before the

Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and colloquially known as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by Pres ...

takes effect in 2014. Healthy Way L.A. provides a primary care provider team to members and expanded access to primary, preventative and specialty services, as well as access to hospital-based inpatient and outpatient services. It is a county implementation of the state

Low Income Health Program Welfare in California consists of federal welfare programs—which are often at least partially administered by state and county agencies—and several independent programs, which are usually administered by the counties. The largest California-s ...

(LIHP). In the 2010-2011 fiscal year, DHS reported a budget surplus of $13.2 million.

Facilities

LADHS comprises a network of medical facilities throughout Los Angeles County, including four

hospital A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment with specialized health science and auxiliary healthcare staff and medical equipment. The best-known type of hospital is the general hospital, which typically has an emergen ...

s, two ambulatory care centers, six Comprehensive Health Centers (CHC), and 10 Health Centers (HC). DHS' Ambulatory Care Network, which was created to provide primary care, outpatient specialty care, and ambulatory surgery, consists of DHS outpatient clinics (Multi-Service Ambulatory Care Centers, Comprehensive Health Centers, and Health Centers).

Medical Centers

LADHS operates three academic

teaching hospital A teaching hospital is a hospital or medical centre that provides medical education and training to future and current health professionals. Teaching hospitals are almost always affiliated with one or more universities and are often co-located ...

s and one

rehabilitation hospital Rehabilitation hospitals, also referred to as inpatient rehabilitation hospitals, are devoted to the rehabilitation of patients with various neurological, musculoskeletal, orthopedic, and other medical conditions following stabilization of their ac ...

: # Harbor-UCLA Medical Center (H-UCLA MC) #

(LAC+USC MC) #

(OV-UCLA MC) #

(RLANRC) Harbor-UCLA Medical Center,

, and

each provides inpatient, outpatient, and emergency services for men, women, and children. The

provides physical therapy services to individuals around the country.

Outpatient Care Centers

LADHS, through its Ambulatory Care Network (ACN), operates two outpatient care centers, which comprise an

urgent care An urgent care center (UCC), also known as an urgent treatment centre in the United Kingdom, is a type of walk-in clinic focused on the delivery of urgent ambulatory care in a dedicated medical facility outside of a traditional emergency departme ...

center as well as

and specialty care clinics: # High Desert Regional Health Center (HD RHC) # Martin Luther King, Jr. Outpatient Center (MLK OC)

Comprehensive Health Centers and Health Centers

LADHS' Ambulatory Care Network operates a network of comprehensive health centers and health centers, which are community-based clinics that provide primary care to patients at their

medical home The medical home, also known as the patient-centered medical home (PCMH), is a team-based health care delivery model led by a health care provider to provide comprehensive and continuous medical care to patients with a goal to obtain maximal heal ...

s, throughout the county. These include six comprehensive health centers (CHCs): #Long Beach Comprehensive Health Center #Edward R. Roybal Comprehensive Health Center #El Monte Comprehensive Health Center #H. Claude Hudson Comprehensive Health Center #Hubert H. Humphrey Comprehensive Health Center #Mid-Valley Comprehensive Health Center LADHS also operates 10 health centers (HCs): #Bellflower Health Center #Wilmington Health Center #Antelope Valley Health Center #South Valley Health Center #La Puente Health Center #Dollarhide Health Center #Glendale Health Center #San Fernando Health Center #Lake Los Angeles Health Center #Little Rock Health Center

Governance

The

oversees the Department of Health Services.

, leads DHS as the Director of Health Service and reports to the LA County Board of Supervisors. DHS leadership also includes: Hal F. Yee Jr., M.D., Chief Medical Officer; Tangerine Brigham, Managed Care Deputy Director; Christina Ghaly, M.D., Deputy Director, Strategic Planning; Alexander K. Li, M.D., CEO, Ambulatory Care Network; Mark Ghaly, M.D., Deputy Director, Community Health; Anish Mahajan, M.D., Director of System Planning, Improvement and Data Analytics; Allan Wecker, Chief Financial Officer; Kevin Lynch, Chief Information Officer; Wendy Schwartz, Director of Board Relations; and Gerardo Pinedo, Director of Government Relations & Policy.

Quality of Care

Rankings

Two hospitals in the DHS system, Harbor-UCLA Medical Center and the Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center, were ranked "best" in the 2012-13 rankings of '' U.S. News & World Reports America's Best Hospitals: *Harbor-UCLA Medical Center was ranked #26 in the

Los Angeles metropolitan area Greater Los Angeles is the second-largest metropolitan region in the United States with a population of 18.5 million in 2021, encompassing five counties in Southern California extending from Ventura County in the west to San Bernardino C ...

and #45 in California. The hospital's

nephrology Nephrology (from Greek'' nephros'' "kidney", combined with the suffix ''-logy'', "the study of") is a specialty of adult internal medicine and pediatric medicine that concerns the study of the kidneys, specifically normal kidney function ( ...

program was also ranked "high-performing". *Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center was ranked #26 in the

and #45 in California. The hospital's rehabilitation program was also ranked "high-performing." Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center has consistently been ranked as one of "America's Best Hospitals" since 1989.

Accreditation

All four hospitals in the DHS system are currently accredited by the

Joint Commission The Joint Commission is a United States-based nonprofit tax-exempt 501(c) organization that accredits more than 22,000 US health care organizations and programs. The international branch accredits medical services from around the world. A majori ...

: # Harbor-UCLA Medical Center (H-UCLA MC) #

(LAC+USC MC) #

(OV-UCLA MC) #

(RLANRC) Harbor-UCLA Medical Center has consistently received the Joint Commission's Medal of Honor for Organ Donation. Most recently, it received a silver medal in 2012.

Volume of Services

DHS provides health services to over 800,000 patients including many uninsured patients. LAC+USC Medical Center provides care for half of

HIV/AIDS Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual ...

and

sickle cell anemia Sickle cell disease (SCD) is a group of blood disorders typically inherited from a person's parents. The most common type is known as sickle cell anaemia. It results in an abnormality in the oxygen-carrying protein haemoglobin found in red bl ...

patients in

Southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most populous urban ...

. In 2012, the DHS system had a hospital bed capacity of 1,465. DHS hospitals had 74,811 admissions, 1,251,553 outpatient visits, and 4,850 births. Over the past 20 years, the number of births performed at DHS hospitals has declined substantially since

Medi-Cal The California Medical Assistance Program (Medi-Cal or MediCal) is California's Medicaid program serving low-income individuals, including families, seniors, persons with disabilities, children in foster care, pregnant women, and childless adults w ...

expanded coverage for

pregnant women Pregnancy is the time during which one or more offspring develops ( gestates) inside a woman's uterus (womb). A multiple pregnancy involves more than one offspring, such as with twins. Pregnancy usually occurs by sexual intercourse, but ca ...

in the 1990s. In Fiscal Year 2011–2012, the DHS system (inclusive of MACCs) received over 300,000 emergency department admissions, over 2.6 million

admissions and nearly 230,000

admissions. DHS hospitals recorded 295,000 emergency department visits, 1.1 million outpatient hospital visits and 76,000 urgent care visits.

Healthcare Programs

My Health LA

Healthy Way LA

Healthy Way LA (HWLA) was a free public health care program available to underinsured or uninsured, low-income residents of Los Angeles (LA) County. The program was a Low Income Health Program (LIHP) approved under the 1115 Waiver. HWLA helped narrow the large gap in access to health care among low-income populations by extending health care insurance to uninsured LA County residents living at 0 percent to 133 percent of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL). Individuals eligible for HWLA are assigned to a medical home within the LA County Department of Health Services (LADHS) or its partners, thus gaining access to continuous primary care, preventive and specialty services, mental health services, and other support systems. HWLA was one of the few sources of coordinated health care for disadvantaged adults without dependents in LA County. As a part of the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid Expansion will phase out the Healthy Way LA program. As a result, 252,379 Healthy Way LA members will automatically be transitioned into Medi-Cal on January 1, 2014.

Community Partner Program

The Community Partners Program is a collaboration between the LADHS and private, community-based providers (Partners) to provide quality health services in a culturally and linguistically appropriate environment to low income and uninsured communities. This program is part of a Medicaid Demonstration Project designed to provide LADHS with federal fiscal relief to preserve vital community clinic capacity, to increase access to primary, dental, and specialty care services, and to develop Community Partners for the provision of these services. The Community Partner Program provides Primary, specialty, and dental care services are available to people of all ages who reside in Los Angeles County and whose net family income is at or below 133-1/3% of the Federal Poverty Level (or are General Relief (GR) Recipients), and who do not qualify for Medi-Cal or any other government or third-party assistance programs. Patients are strongly encouraged to make an appointment at one of the Partner sites to find out if they are eligible for Community Partners or other funded health care services.

Housing for Health

Housing for Health is a LADHS program that provides chronically homeless patients with housing. A chronically homeless person is defined as a homeless individual with at least one disabling condition that has been continuously homeless for one year or has had at least four episodes of homelessness in the past three years. Housing for Health began enrolling participants on March 1, 2007 and is funded by LA County Homeless Prevention Initiative. The Housing for Health program reduced emergency room visits by 77%. Inpatient visits were also reduced by 77% and there was an 85% reduction the number of days of these visits. Participants in the Housing for Health program used an average of $32,000 less of DHS acute medical services. DHS will operate a primary care clinic and a supportive housing development lab in the

Star Apartments The Star Apartments are a purpose-built residential housing complex on Los Angeles' Skid Row that caters to the needs of the long-term homeless. Opened in October 2014, the Star Apartments include 102 units averaging 350 square feet, alongside ame ...

, which is a 100 unit apartment complex in Downtown Los Angeles’ Skid Row under construction for the chronically homeless by the Skid Row Housing Trust.

References

External links

Official LA County Department of Health Services websiteLA County Department of Mental Health websiteLA County Department of Public Health website
{{authority control Health departments in California County government agencies in California Government of Los Angeles County, California Hospital networks in the United States Healthcare in Los Angeles 1972 establishments in California