Measures are now being taken to help deal with the UK's aging population, which is set to cause a huge rise in the number of older people living with long-term illnesses. According to experts, by 2025, there will be a significant increase in the number of elderly patients suffering from heart disease, osteoporosis, and dementia.
It is estimated that as many as 150,000 Britons will turn to medical travel for treatments and procedures—those not provided or not fully funded by the NHS—this year. Savings are often as much as 50%, which includes travel and accommodation expenses. And according to experts, this trend is growing among Britons.
Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick has asked the state's most prominent hospital and health insurance leaders to take quick action to hold down rapidly rising healthcare costs, suggesting that if they did not take steps on their own, they might face new government regulation. Patrick said he is considering holding hearings on health insurance premiums and the primary driver of premium increases—the rates hospitals charge insurers for members' medical care. He has also said the state Division of Insurance has the power to reject rates it deems excessive.
Economic and cultural forces reshaping U.S. medicine are prompting an exodus from surgery, creating a growing market for temporary surgeons-for-hire. General surgery is now among the fastest-growing areas of a temporary-medical-staffing industry that's expected to double to $2.1 billion in 2009 from five years ago, according to Locumtenens.com, a staffing agency.
Trent Crable has been named chief executive officer and managing director of Washington, DC-based George Washington University Hospital. He had been serving as the interim CEO since June 2008, and previously served as the hospital's chief operating officer.
With the financing coming together for St. Bernard Parish's first post-Hurricane Katrina hospital, officials are now considering the question of where to build it. Two sites have emerged as possibilities: a tract across from the parish government complex, owned by a local nonprofit group, and the Village Square site in Chalmette, LA, that will soon be bought by a private investor. The public board assigned to build the hospital is expected to choose a site in January, a decision that will affect who has control over the hospital's expansion and any future development nearby.