A Smyrna, TN, urgent-care clinic has a new vending machine in its waiting room that dispenses acute-care prescription medications for sick patients who don't want to wait in line at a pharmacy. Tennessee Urgent Care Associates installed the ATM-like medication dispenser about two months ago to become the second urgent-care clinic in the state to offer prescription medications in a vending machine. If a patient seen at the urgent clinic needs a prescription, the doctor can send one to the machine during the visit, and the medicine is retrieved on the way out.
Saint Thomas Health Services has a new leader in Michael Schatzlein, 59, who was chief executive of hospital operator Community Health Systems Inc.'s Lutheran Health Network and DuPont Hospital out of Fort Wayne, IN. He will become president and CEO of the Ascension Health-owned, Nashville-based four-hospital system on July 1. He replaces Patrick J. Madden, who had been the interim CEO since February 2009.
With a physician shortage looming, in 2006 the Association of American Medical Colleges set a goal of boosting first-year med school enrollment by 30% between 2002's baseline and 2015. It is going to miss that target by a few years, the AAMC announced in its 2009 med school enrollment survey. The group's Center for Workforce Studies said enrollment will be up by 23% in 2015, to 20,281, and up a projected 30% in 2018.
In the seven weeks since the health reform legislation passed, at least a dozen lawsuits have been filed in federal courts to challenge it, according to the Justice Department. But the case that could carry the most weight, and may be on the fastest track in the most advantageous venue, is the one filed in Pensacola, FL, by state officials, just minutes after President Obama signed the bill. Some legal scholars, including some who normally lean to the left, believe the states have identified the law's weak spot and devised a credible theory for eviscerating it, the New York Times reports.
The Orlando VA Medical Center has named Kenneth Goldberg, MD, chief of staff. He will oversee the care of nearly 90,000 Central Florida veterans while helping plan the new Orlando VA Medical Center, a $665 million project slated to open in 2012 in the Lake Nona "medical city" complex. Before his appointment in Orlando, Goldberg was the deputy chief of staff at the VA Medical Center in Durham, NC, where he coordinated clinical activities.
MedStar Health and Franklin Square Hospital Center have appointed Adrienne Kirby president of the hospital. Kirby replaces Carl Schindelar, who was promoted to the position of executive vice president of hospital operations for the Baltimore Division of MedStar Health. Kirby began her new role at Franklin Square on May 3. Kirby comes to Franklin Square from Virtua, a four-hospital system in Southwest New Jersey, where she most recently served as COO for Ambulatory Services and Programs for Excellence.