Florida's Agency for Health Care Administration is investigating charges that a 13-year-old Cuban boy aided was denied admission to Miami Children's Hospital hours before he died on March 8.

Fima Lifshitz, the hospital's director of medical personnel, confirmed that an official investigation was begun into the case of Victor Manuel Sexto, a victim of Hodgkin's lymphoma, a malignant cancer of the lymph glands.

``We do not believe that the best place to die is a hospital. The boy had to be in a familiar environment and -- at the stage he was -- he didn't need a hospital,'' Lifshitz said.

Victor Manuel was taken on the same day to Baptist Hospital in Kendall, where he died two hours after admission.

The charge was made by a doctor at Palm Springs Hospital in Hialeah, according to an unidentified source at the state health-care agency.

Palm Springs Hospital administrator Pablo Milanes said he could neither confirm nor deny that an investigation is ongoing. So did a spokesman for the Agency for Health Care Administration, Patrick Glenn.

The boy's treatment has become a source of contention between Miami Children's Hospital and the Willy Chirino Foundation, created by salsa singer Willy Chirino to underwrite medical care in the United States for Latin American children.

In April 1998, the foundation began to consider Victor Manuel's case. But while it studied the case, the boy's father, Luis Sexto, obtained a humanitarian visa for his son and brought him to Miami unannounced.

``They appeared all of a sudden, and we couldn't just abandon them. We recommended that they go to Miami Children's,'' said Gisela Hidalgo, then the foundation's executive director. She now heads the Human Development Center for the Caribbean and Central America.

For about one month, the hospital put Victor Manuel through several tests, while it provided him with emergency treatment. Doctors at the hospital diagnosed Hodgkin's disease, stage four, the most advanced and malignant phase of the disease.

``Actually, what the boy needed most was palliative care, the treatment given to terminal patients. I'm surprised to hear that he lasted that long,'' said Dr. Mario Reyes of Miami Children's Hospital, who assisted the Sextos during their stay at the hospital.

According to Hidalgo, the hospital forced Victor Manuel to leave, because of the high cost of his treatment. The hospital insists that the boy was released at his parents' insistence.

In the summer of 1998, the hospital sent a $200,000 bill to the Willy Chirino Foundation, which refused to pay it.

``The foundation never accepted responsibility for the boy and I don't understand why [the hospital] sent us the bill,'' Chirino said.

According to Reyes, Luis Sexto agreed to pay for his son's hospitalization. Sexto, who is back in Cuba, did not return calls from El Nuevo Herald.