| HealthLeaders Media Finance - July 16, 2007 | Fairbrook's Last Chance |
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Fairbrook's Last Chance
Philip Betbeze, Senior Editor-Finance
Coming in November, I'll be writing a short HealthLeaders magazine piece about a big Washington state IPA's adoption of an EMR/physician practice management system for its members. As it's the middle of summer and 95 degrees outside, I'm reminded yet again how far ahead we plan in the magazine business. But as this newsletter and about a dozen others we offer at HealthLeaders Media shows, we're not exclusively in the magazine business anymore. And that's a good thing, because parts of this story needed telling before November.
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July 16, 2007 | |
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Editor's Picks
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Atlanta's troubled Grady Hospital sends suburbs a bill
It's a gutsy move, but one William Loughrey, a board member at Atlanta's Grady Hospital, felt he had to make. He is sending a message, if not an actual bill, to neighboring county commissioners who he says don't pay their fair share for their citizens' use of financially troubled Grady. Loughrey told suburban Cobb County commissioners that the county owed the hospital more than $4 million for uncompensated care to its citizens in 2006-a year the hospital lost $67 million. He plans visits to other surrounding counties whose poor patients get care at Grady as well. [Read More]
University of Louisville hospital partners leaving
A financial turnaround success at the University of Louisville's University Hospital and James Graham Brown Cancer Center means those who engineered it are leaving. Norton Healthcare and Jewish Hospital and St. Mary's Healthcare announced they will leave the 12-year-old partnership with the University of Louisville under which they strengthened University Hospital financially and clinically such that it no longer needs the partnership to survive. It ends a relationship where the hospital was effectively governed by its two main competitors. [Read More]
Prime Healthcare draws criticism for financial moves at California hospitals
This extensive story begins with a ride by the reporter in a hospital owner's $1.4 million helicopter and only gets better from there. Cardiologist Prem Reddy, MD, now has eight hospitals in his portfolio and has made them profitable by canceling insurance contracts when he takes them over. But after acquiring six of his eight hospitals in the last two years, he's drawing attention from patient advocates that he's cutting out unprofitable services and operating at below federal minimum safety standards. [Read More]
Redesigning care delivery in response to a high-performance network
This HealthAffairs article examines a clinical care process transformation at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle after a major insurer threatened to exclude it from its high-performance network. But the deeper analysis is on the authors' contention that making the business case for sustaining desirable provider behavior may require that purchasers and plans make equally fundamental changes in payment policy. [Read More] |
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Finance Forum
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IRS Hospital Project Could Cause Big Changes
Internal Revenue Service officials are preparing a report that assesses how nonprofit hospitals provide community benefit in exchange for tax exemption. Contributor Don Stuart explains the compliance project and how it could affect facilities across the country. [Read More] |
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Finance Headlines
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North Carolina hospital system plans $9.5 million facility
Raleigh News & Observer - July 16, 2007
Chicago hospitals explore partnership
Chicago Tribune - July 16, 2007
Hospitals' online prices make watchdogs wary
AP/Chicago Tribune - July 16, 2007
Upcoming Events
HealthLeaders Media News - July 16, 2007 | |
| From HealthLeaders Magazine |
Challenge in Carolina
 Safety-net provider. Teaching institution. Testing ground for new technology. UNC Health Care is all of these things-welcome to life as an academic medical center. [Read More]
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Money Talk
A look at one hospital's struggles to improve
 North Oakland Medical Center, Pontiac, MI
Rating: B1
Outlook: Watchlist
Affected Debt: $39 million
Agency: Moody's Investors Service
Remarks: Continued decline in operating performance and a decline in unrestricted liquidity since 2005, however, new management team in place with senior-level experience at prominent, highly-rated health system.
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Audio Feature
A New (Old) Player in Healthcare Finance: Mike Gervais, CEO of the Philadelphia-based specialty lending firm Gemino Healthcare Finance, talks about how the market for his new company's services has changed in recent years. | |
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