Health insurers are girding for a fight over who should regulate the new marketplaces that would sell policies to 30 million Americans under the healthcare bills pending in Congress, the Wall Street Journal reports. Congressional Democrats and insurance companies both say they want robust regulation of the "exchanges" to prevent deceptive marketing of health plans and to ensure that customers can exercise the rights guaranteed by the bills. At issue is who should do the regulating: the federal government, as the House bill says, or the states, as the Senate prescribes, the Journal reports.
A task force of Florida agencies announced that it recovered $287 million in Medicaid overpayments and prevented more than $18.9 million in improper payments in the fiscal year that ended in June. The task force consists of the Florida Attorney General's Medicaid Fraud Control Unit and the Agency for Health Care Administration's Medicaid Program Integrity.
Orlando Health unveiled its new $27.5 million parking garage at a Jan. 7 ceremony. The new parking garage at Orlando Regional Medical Center is part of a medical office and surgery center project currently under construction, and is part of a multi-year expansion plan. In December, Orlando Health announced plans to renovate and expand Orlando Regional Medical Center, which will be one of the largest expansion efforts in the history of of the hospital system, the Orlando Business Journal reports.
A yearlong dispute over the adequacy of Massachusetts payments to Boston Medical Center has resulted in an open and pointed disagreement between the hospital's outgoing president and Governor Deval Patrick, the Boston Globe reports. In a letter to the hospital's board chairman, Patrick wrote that, during a speech to wealthy hospital donors, Boston Medical Center president Elaine Ullian made comments that were "wrong" and "unhelpful" when she asserted that the state is neglecting its financial responsibility to the hospital. In July, Boston Medical Center filed a lawsuit against the state health and human services secretary, accusing state officials of illegally cutting payments made to the hospital for treating thousands of poor patients.
Due an overwhelming budget deficit, Miami's public hospital system stopped paying for kidney dialysis for the indigent, officials said, leaving some patients to rely on emergency rooms for their life-sustaining treatments. A total of 175 patients were affected by the decision by Jackson Health System, which runs South Florida's largest charity hospital, Jackson Memorial, and a number of smaller hospitals and clinics. The situation at Jackson is similar to that at Atlanta's public hospital, Grady Memorial, which closed its outpatient dialysis clinic in early October to curb costs, the New York Times reports.
President Obama told House Democratic leaders that they should include a tax on high-priced insurance policies favored by the Senate in the final version of far-reaching healthcare legislation, reports the New York Times. The White House has long expressed a preference for the excise tax on high-cost plans, which health economists say could help control long-term healthcare spending. But House Democrats and many organized labor groups have resisted the idea because the tax may hit a number of generous union-sponsored health plans.