Meredith Jobe has been named General Counsel for Adventist Health, according to Robert G. Carmen, president and CEO of the Roseville, California-based health care system. Jobe will assume this position in early February. Jobe will manage internal legal affairs of Adventist Health and provide legal advice and counsel to members of the senior management team on a wide variety of operational and clinical matters. Due to his new role, Jobe will resign his seat on the Adventist Health board of directors; he will retain his seat on the White Memorial Medical Center board of directors. Most recently Jobe was the senior partner in his Glendale, CA law firm.
At a time when hospitals seem to change CEOs almost as frequently as bed linens, the 27-year tenure of Bethesda Memorial Hospital's approachable CEO, Robert B. Hill, is more than a little unusual. Nationally, the median tenure for a hospital CEO was 3.6 years, according to the most recent survey by the American College of Healthcare Executives, done in 2005. "I am only the third CEO in the 52-year history of the hospital," Hill said. Hill announced plans to retire in February, when his longtime No. 2, Chief Operating Officer Roger L. Kirk, will succeed him.
LifePoint Hospitals announced that Leif Murphy has been named executive vice president and chief development officer, effective early November. Murphy joins the company from DSI Renal, Inc., where he served as president/CEO. Prior to DSI, Murphy was senior vice president and treasurer at Caremark, Inc. He also has held leadership roles at Renal Care Group, Inc., National Nephrology Associates, Inc. and HealthSouth Corporation.
Managed-care company Cigna Corp. said Monday it will buy fellow health insurer HealthSpring Inc. in a $3.8 billion deal that would boost Cigna's Medicare Advantage business. The Bloomfield, Conn., company will pay $55 per share in cash for HealthSpring, which is based in Nashville, Tenn. That represents a 37 percent premium over the stock's Friday closing price of $40.16. HealthSpring shares soared 33 percent, or $13.34, to $53.50 in premarket trading, while Cigna stock was up more than 3 percent, or $1.55, to $46.25. Cigna said the boards of directors for both companies have approved the deal, and it is expected to close in the first half of 2012.
Leflunomide offers a big window onto some worrisome trends in the pharmaceutical industry, including manufacturing problems and drug shortages that can result not just in price spikes, but in big disruptions in patient care - sometimes even deaths.It's not entirely clear why leflunomide became scarce, or who benefited from the price increases. The good news is that at least they appear to have been temporary. One clear factor in the shortage was a suspension in imports by Apotex, the U.S. arm of a Canadian maker of generics, after inspectors from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration found problems at two of its Toronto facilities in September 2009.
State employee Jan Mathews switched from Cigna to BlueCross for health insurance last year to save money on premiums. This year she plans to switch back, to avoid paying more to use The Women's Hospital at Centennial Medical Center. "They're just known for having exceptional health services for women, and my OB/GYN is there," Mathews said. TriStar Health System hopes more state employees will make the same choice. The local HCA unit, which includes The Women's Hospital and eight others, doesn't participate in BlueCross' Network S, offered to state workers and early retirees.