Independence Blue Cross and Radnor, PA-based Jefferson Health System have reached an agreement on new three-year contracts. The new agreement, effective June 1, 2008, covers Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals, including its Jefferson Hospital for Neuroscience division and Methodist Hospital division; the Main Line Health hospitals; and the three Frankford Hospital campuses.
Tampa, FL-based African Ambassadors began serving the community in 2003 with only two doctors, a nurse and slim funding. It has since helped nearly 2,000 patients who can't afford adequate healthcare, organizers say. African Ambassadors is a nonprofit organization that gives secondary medical support to Tampa residents. The organization also provides free healthcare to those who have insufficient health insurance or none at all. Patients pay what they can afford, which oftentimes is nothing.
An estimated 300 to 400 U.S. doctors kill themselves each year, which some doctors say is because the stigma of mental illness is magnified in a profession that prides itself on stoicism and bravado. And because doctors have easy access to prescription drugs and a precise knowledge of both how the body works and the amount of a drug needed for an overdose to stop breathing and halt the heart, it can be a dangerous combination. The American Medical Association has even called physician suicide "an endemic catastrophe."
Cato T. Laurencin, MD, has been tapped by the University of Connecticut to head its troubled health center in Farmington, CT. Lurencin, an orthopedic surgeon is currently chairman of orthopedics at the University of Virginia, and will start Aug. 11 as the university's vice president for health affairs at the UConn Health Center and dean of the UConn medical school. The UConn Health Center now faces a $22 million deficit and is seeking help from the state to stay afloat while it negotiates a more permanent solution with nearby hospitals.
Jeanette, PA-based Mercy Jeannette Hospital has finalized its sale to Excela Health in an effort to stem losses while continuing to provide local hospital care and hundreds of jobs to the area. The hospital, which was renamed Excela Health Westmoreland Hospital at Jeannette, lost $6.5 million from its operations last year. Some services are moving to other Excela facilities, but Mercy Jeannette will continue providing emergency care; inpatient care, and advanced diagnostics.
North Carolina regulators have rejected plans by WakeMed and Rex Healthcare to continue building satellite campuses in rapidly growing sections of Wake County. The proposals would have brought urgent care centers and other services to the North Carolina communities of North Raleigh, Cary, Holly Springs and Garner. State analysts questioned hospital officials' projections that involve market share and the rate at which services would be used. They also suggested that the areas where the construction was proposed were already adequately served.