The LSU Medical Center Health Care Services Division acquired management responsibilities for the former Louisiana Health Care Authority by Act 3 of 1997. The LSUMC, HCSD is responsible for the governance, administrative direction and management of a statewide system of eleven state operated acute care hospitals whose primary mission is to serve the state's indigent population. The mission of the system emphasizes (1) the provision of health services to the uninsured and to other citizens with problems of access to care, and (2) the creation and maintenance of physical, clinical and administrative environments appropriate to the education of physicians and other health professionals. This agency consists of two major areas: administration and medical centers. The medical centers include the E.A. Conway Medical Center, the Earl K. Long Medical Center, the Huey P. Long Medical Center, the University Medical Center, the W.O. Moss Regional Medical Center, the Lallie Kemp Regional Medical Center, the Washington-St. Tammany Regional Medical Center, the Leonard J. Chabert Medical Center, the Charity Hospital & Medical Center of Louisiana at New Orleans. (MCLNO)
The medical centers provide access to health care for the indigent and near indigent families residing in Louisiana. Services provided include inpatient and outpatient hospital services necessary to provide treatment against illness, to protect against infections and epidemics, and to medically safeguard the lives of the people in Louisiana, giving priority when necessary to the indigent population. In addition, the medical centers, in cooperation with the Office of Public Health (OPH), provide services to children in many programs including:
Acute or on-going medical care for Maternal and Child Health;
Family Planning services and referrals in the hospital maternity wards in cooperation with OPH;
Women, Infants and Children services in connection with prenatal and some child health services;
Handicapped Children Services Program clinics in the hospitals;
In cooperation with OPH, Healthy Futures provides patients in the MCLNO prenatal care service with education, counseling, nutrition, case management services and obstetric consultation on a plan of care.
It is estimated that approximately 33% of HCSD facility inpatient admissions are children, and consequently it is estimated that about 33% of total HCSD program expenditures represent expenditures that benefit children. Shown below is a compilation of estimated HCSD expenditures for children that are included in the Governor's Executive Budget Supporting Document Recommendation.
RESOURCE ALLOCATION FOR CHILDREN