OFFICIALS WEIGH MEDICAL-SPECIMEN LAW; BURBANK COUNCIL TO CONSIDER MEASURE FOR SAFEGUARDING SUPPLIES.

Byline: Donna Huffaker Daily News Staff Writer

The Burbank City Council tonight will discuss whether to draft an ordinance to prohibit medical specimens - like vials of blood and urine - from being left outside and unsecured.

Councilman Ted McConkey has requested the city's administrative staff to investigate regulating the security of medical supplies because of the Feb. 16 incident at Lakeside Medical Associates where four Burbank children played with specimens left behind the building.

The boys, ages 7 to 13, made a mess of blood, urine and tissue samples left outside for a courier to pick up, Burbank police said.

One of the boys, they said, went home with blood on his hands and a vial of blood in his possession. The specimens were awaiting collection by a courier from SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratories.

After police and the Burbank City Attorney's Office investigated the incident, Lt. Don Brown said there was no criminal wrongdoing by the medical facility, and he has handed the case to the Los Angeles County Health Department for further review.

Although it appears Lakeside Medical Associates has broken no laws, state Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Pasadena, said it is irresponsible to leave such potentially hazardous specimens outside in an unlocked box where anybody, particularly children, can get into them.

``These kids were curious; they were just being kids. An unlocked box is as inviting to kids as a swimming pool,'' Schiff said by phone from Sacramento.

Schiff's staff members are investigating whether there are any state statutes or regulations that dictate how to safely stow medical supplies, a spokesman for the senator said Monday, noting Schiff may propose legislation if nothing is on the books.

A spokesman for Lakeside Medical Associates did not return phone calls Monday.

The week of the incident, Los Angeles City Councilman Joel Wachs said he would like to see a law that would require medical facilities that collect or store blood or other bodily fluids to keep them in a locked container.

According to Shirley Fannin of the L.A. County Health Department, the children have all been given routine post-exposure blood tests for hepatitis B, hepatitis C and HIV, she said Monday. Family physicians for the children administered the tests. Fannin said she believes there was no exposure or the Health Department would have been notified.

``The children should not have been bothering someone else's property, but there should be better control of specimens so the public cannot access them,'' she said.

McConkey agrees.

He said if there isn't an ordinance in place he would like to propose one to mandate storing medical specimens in a safe container in a locked facility.

Aside from a possible threat to the public's health, unattended blood or urine specimens that are tampered with could skew medical tests, McConkey said.

On Feb. 16, the majority of specimens inside three metal boxes and a plastic foam cooler were not disturbed, a spokesman for SmithKline Beecham has said. Seven out of 50 patients will need to submit new samples, he has said.

City Councilman Bill Wiggins said Monday there should be some procedure in place to ensure this type of incident does not happen again.

The City Council will meet tonight at 7 p.m.