NAPLES, FLA. — Hospital operator Health Management Associates said Wednesday its new board of directors is reviewing its planned $3.9 billion sale to Franklin, Tenn.-based Community Health Systems. HMA said its board has retained Lazard and UBS as independent advisers and engaged legal and financial counsel to help as part of the review. It said Community Health Systems agreed to those moves. Community Health Systems Inc. agreed to buy HMA in late July for $13.78 a share. The acquisition that would create a large U.S. hospital chain just as the federal health care overhaul begins adding millions of newly insured people to the health care system.
This week the Department of Health and Human Services released a ton of information about how insurance sold in 36 states under the Affordable Care Act will work. Most of it came in the form of data showing the number of carriers and their premium prices in hundreds of regions. Until now we've seen information on subsidized policies to be sold through online marketplaces released in trickles by states that are creating their own online portals. The federal data covers states that dumped all or part of the work of building the marketplaces on the feds.
(Reuters) - Shares of Premier Inc rose 15 percent in their market debut on Thursday as investors bet on the medical supply-chain management company's cost-effective services that complement a broader regulatory goal of lower healthcare spending. Premier's initial public offering valued the company at about $4.40 billion. The company's stock was up 14 percent at $30.72 in late-morning trading after touching a high of $31. About 14 million shares changed hands, making Premier one of the heavily traded stocks on the Nasdaq.
Small-business health exchanges run by the federal government will not open for online enrollment until November, the Obama administration said Thursday. But applicants may still enroll by phone, mail or fax beginning Oct. 1. The White House had initially planned to launch these marketplaces, which serve businesses with fewer than 50 employees, on Tuesday, the same day that individual marketplaces go live. While the Web sites of the federally run exchanges will go live on that date, an administration official said that the "feature of shopping for and comparing plans online will be available starting Nov. 1."
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A national health policy nonprofit on Thursday announced it is making California the focal point of a long-term research project to examine whether the Affordable Care Act lives up to expectations for the uninsured. The Kaiser Family Foundation released the initial results of interviews with 2,000 randomly selected Californians who had lacked health insurance for at least two months. The study will follow the respondents for two years, as they examine their options under the federal health care law. The act reaches its most notable public milestone Tuesday when the exchanges that act as marketplaces for insurance shopping open for business.
Loretta Pierce is only 46, but she has already retired from nursing in favor of a desk job. After years of lifting heavy patients and equipment that resulted in a herniated disc, she said she knew her body just couldn't handle the work anymore. Nursing aides, orderlies and attendants suffer more musculoskeletal injuries than people in any other profession – including firefighters, according to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Registered nurses also endure more of these injuries than the average worker.