State Scraps Plans to Lift Hospital’s License

After a return visit to the Tri-City Regional Medical Center in Hawaiian Gardens--cited last week for serious patient care problems--state inspectors have withdrawn their recommendation to deny an operating license to the hospital.

Investigators have determined that the violations discovered during last week’s inspection--including unauthorized physical restraints on seven patients--have been corrected, a supervisor for the state licensing authority said.

“Whatever problems there were, were remedied enough,” said county Department of Health Services supervisor Eric Stone.

Beryl Weiner, an attorney for Tri-City, said the hospital has fired a handful of nurses who were found to have restrained the patients without physicians’ orders. Also, several physicians, cited last week for working without being assigned their clinical privileges, have now formally received them, Weiner said.