A nationwide network to collect data on blood transfusion and recipient outcomes will include four metro Atlanta hospitals at its launch. Proponents of the network say that analysis of the data will help ensure patient and donor safety, as well as lower healthcare costs. A deeper data pool would also help the network find trends and recommend treatments to reduce disease and mortality rates for patients and donors, they added.
A state task force is examining why the use of hospital emergency rooms in Maine is significantly higher than the national average. Unnecessary use of emergency room services drives up healthcare spending in the state, and a number of hospitals are seeking approval to expand their emergency departments, said Maine officials.
Massachusetts General Hospital and Concord, MA-based Emerson Hospital are collaborating on an advanced cardiac care clinic that will move some of MGH's expertise to the suburbs. The new center will include specialists in heart electrical systems, women's heart disease, and advanced heart failure. The MGH-Emerson Cardiovascular Center will be located in a medical specialty building about a mile from Emerson. The collaboration follows a trend of academic medical centers creating suburban outposts, giving them an expanded geographic reach and a flow of patient referrals. The suburban hospitals add advanced services without having to hire doctors, and get to piggyback on the better-known hospital's brand name.
After President Bush sought to block a bill aimed at forestalling an 11% cut in payments to doctors taking care of Medicare patients, Congress quickly overrode his veto. The House voted 383 to 41 for the override, while the Senate voted 70 to 26. Both cases were far more than the two-thirds necessary to block the veto. At issue in this bill was how the government should respond to a planned reduction in Medicare doctors’ fees, mandated by a formula that requires the cuts if certain spending targets are not reached. Under the formula, a 10.6% cut in fees for doctors was supposed to go into effect, but Congress voted instead to reduce the reimbursement to insurance companies that serve Medicare beneficiaries under its managed-care program.
Two years after construction began, Louisville, KY-based Baptist Hospital East will hold a public open house to show off the first three floors of a 144-bed addition. The $130 million Park Tower addition also includes an outpatient surgery center with eight operating rooms that will open next month. That project will be followed in phases by private patient rooms and other care units still under construction.
The Missouri Court of Appeals has ordered a long-running antitrust case by 3,000 Kansas City-area doctors against several insurers to be submitted to arbitration. The Court of Appeals reversed a lower court ruling, agreeing with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas City and United Healthcare Services that the antitrust claims were covered by arbitration agreements. The case, which was filed in 2005, alleges that Blue Cross, United Healthcare and Coventry Health Care of Kansas violated antitrust laws by fixing prices and engaging in other monopolistic behavior.