San Francisco-based Dignity Health, formerly Catholic Healthcare West, said Monday it will acquire U.S. HealthWorks, which bills itself as the largest independent operator of occupational medicine and urgent care centers in the United States. U.S. HealthWorks's top executive is Daniel Crowley, who was chairman of Rancho Cordova-based Foundation Health Corp. before it merged with Health Systems International in 1997. Crowley remains based in Sacramento. During Crowley's tenure, Foundation was Sacramento's largest company, employing nearly 3,000 in the area.
Consumer Reports is dipping its toe into an increasingly popular area. The organization is working with groups in Wisconsin and Minnesota to develop physician ratings in those states as well, although they won't be focused on patient experience as they are in Massachusetts, says John Santa, director of the company's health ratings center. Minnesota's ratings will focus on quality of care, while Wisconsin's will focus on preventive care. Massachusetts doctors support the project, says Richard Aghababian, president of the Massachusetts Medical Society. "We want all of our physicians to feel they should be accountable for the care they provide," he says.
As most healthcare providers know, the federal government is insisting that hospitals and practices improve their e-patient engagement strategy in order to meet Stage 2 Meaningful Use criteria. Private insurers are already going down this same path. When faced with such mandates, health IT executives and clinical leaders can take the parts changer's approach to patient engagement, or do a deeper root-cause analysis to find the best technology to address the issue. So how do you get patients more invested in their own care? Technology is only part of the answer. An organization's core mission and its attitude toward patients are even more important.
Every drug, device or medical supply company must report transfers of value that exceed $10 to the new federal database maintained by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMMS). Last month CMMS announced it's delaying implementation until January 2013 to allow it more time to create the needed infrastructure, but at least twelve companies are already reporting payments in a less uniform and streamlined fashion. A database maintained by ProPublica makes this data easy to search for interested citizens and healthcare reporters. The ProPublica database has raised important questions for academic medical centers replete with physicians who serve as pharmaceutical company spokespeople.
Six years after Gov. Mitt Romney signed the nation's most ambitious health care law, supporters say the Massachusetts law holds promise for the long-term success of Barack Obama's plan. Like the federal law it inspired, the Massachusetts law has multiple goals, among them expanding the number of insured residents, reducing emergency room visits, penalizing those who can afford coverage but opt to remain uninsured, and requiring employers to offer coverage or pay a fine. Supporters of the Massachusetts experiment are quick to point out its successes.
To help with these complex decisions about offering coverage to employees, the New Jersey Hospital Association launched a new tool on Monday called RIPE—Reform Insurance Penalty Estimator—to help employers determine if they are at risk for penalties. The tool uses simple spreadsheets to calculate if the employer is at risk for penalty, using employee salaries and benefits, as well as what the penalty would be. The tool also does a calculation for 2014 penalty possibilities, incorporating inflation.