An experienced surgeon at Boston-based Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center recently operated on the wrong side of a patient, a mistake disclosed in an e-mail that hospital administrators sent to staff members. Massachusetts authorities are investigating the errant surgery, which happened during an elective procedure. The mistake happened as hospitals, regulators, and insurers are devoting unprecedented attention to combating medical errors. In June, Massachusetts said it would stop reimbursing hospitals for medical costs associated with mistakes.
With the stock markets sagging, gas prices increasing, and the economy ailing, doctors, dentists and hospitals are fighting to stay out of the red. Experts say it'll likely be a while before their higher costs are passed on to consumers, because salaries and other contracts are negotiated at intervals over the year. With medical inflation already running at 4.5% this year, compared with 4.1% for overall consumer prices, the rising costs will inevitably creep into patients' bills, experts say.
Experts say emergency rooms have become all-purpose dumping grounds for the mentally ill, with patients routinely marooned a day or more while staff try to find someone to care for them. A survey of hundreds of U.S. hospitals released by the American College of Emergency Physicians found that 79% reported that they routinely "boarded" psychiatric patients in their waiting rooms for at least some period of time because of the unavailability of immediate services. One-third reported that those stays averaged at least eight hours, and 6% said they had average waits of more than 24 hours for the next step in a patient's care.
California's drug and alcohol diversion program for doctors has quietly ceased operation after 27 years. The now-defunct program for physicians was operated by the California Medical Board. California Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas has now authored a bill which would set uniform standards by January 2010 to monitor health professionals in treatment programs.
Newton (NJ) Memorial Hospital is dropping Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey due to a dispute over reimbursement payments.
The 148-bed hospital insists it needs to receive larger reimbursements from Horizon, but New Jersey's oldest and largest health insurer refuses to pay more. Due to the impasse, Newton Memorial is terminating its contract with Horizon on July 22. Unless an agreement is reached before then, Newton Memorial will be "out-of-network" on Nov. 23 for about 900 Horizon subscribers.
Although contract termination between hospitals and insurers are not uncommon, Newton Memorial president and CEO Tom Senker said the negotiations breakdown with Horizon is "a major dispute."
A jury has awarded the former director of neonatal intensive care at Kansas City-based Research Medical Center and Independence, MO-based Centerpoint Medical Center $4.95 million in a lawsuit over his termination. The jury found in favor of William H. Topper on his claims of wrongful interference and defamation against Research; Centerpoint; HCA Midwest Division, the owner of the hospitals; and HCA Physician Services, the HCA unit that employs physicians. Topper was awarded $1.1 million in compensatory damages and $2.1 million in punitive damages on the wrongful-interference claim. It awarded him an additional $1 million in compensatory damages and $750,000 in punitive damages on the defamation claim.