Edition: U.S. / Global   Published: June 4, 1996  At least a
dozen of New York City's private hospitals are planning large-
scale layoffs next month or are late in paying significant
bills, concrete signals that the long-predicted financial crisis
for the region's private hospitals has finally arrived.
Squeezed by sharp Medicaid cuts and the rise of health
maintenance organizations, a handful of private hospitals this
month notified the city's principal hospital workers union that
they intend to lay off 517 union members July 1, a huge increase
from the usual rate of 50 a month. And many other hospital
workers will lose their jobs as well. St. Luke's-Roosevelt
Hospital Center in Manhattan will eliminate hundreds of
positions from its work force on July 1, including 160 from the
hospital workers union, 34 registered nurses and more than 100
supervisory jobs.  At the same time, some hospitals, mostly
those in poor neighborhoods, have fallen hundreds of thousands
of dollars behind in paying bills for services li