HCA Holdings' shares rose 3.4 percent in their first day of public trading Thursday, bucking an otherwise dismal day on Wall Street that was rocked by weak global economic news and a slump in oil companies. But the Nashville-based hospital chain gained $1.02 per share to finish at $31.02 on the day after HCA and stockholders sold 126.2 million shares in the largest private-equity-backed initial public offering of stock in U.S history. Analysts caution against reading too much into the results on any stock's first trading day because interest often is high at the outset of a new issue, including from institutional buyers and sellers rearranging their stock portfolios.
Washington Hospital Center spent about $6 million to hire 600 temporary nurses, beef up security and cover other costs during last week's nurses' strike and subsequent lockout at the region's largest hospital, hospital officials said. Janis Orlowski, the hospital's CMO, also said that more than 500 of the facility's 1,600 nurses crossed the picket line during Friday's strike. Ken Zinn, a spokesman for National Nurses United, which represents the nurses, said he could not confirm the hospital's figures but thought they were inflated. Union officials say more than 1,000 nurses took part in last week's job action. The nurses walked off the job for a one-day strike but were locked out by the hospital from Saturday until Wednesday, when they started returning about 5 a.m., hospital spokeswoman So Young Pak said. There was no drop in business between Friday and Wednesday.
Tulane Medical Center in New Orleans has notified 360 patients that it failed to properly sanitize gastrointestinal scoping equipment used during seven weeks last fall, potentially exposing the group to various infectious diseases. Robert Lynch, MD, the hospital's CEO, acknowledged the error in a Jan. 3 letter that invited affected patients to obtain free screening for hepatitis B, hepatitis C and HIV. The letter, however, characterized the chances of infection as "minimal to non-existent." Lynch cited a mistake in one of five steps in its sanitizing protocol and framed the tests as a way "to reassure patients whose procedures were impacted." State epidemiologist Raoult Ratard, MD, who has conferred with Tulane officials about the case, said the chances of the equipment transmitting an infection "would be extremely, extremely small. I think Tulane just wants to be careful." That has not satisfied at least one patient, identified as "John Doe" in the lawsuit he filed Feb. 22 in Orleans Parish Civil District Court.
Operating rooms at John Cochran VA Medical Center reopened Thursday, more than a month after they were closed when employees noticed spots on surgical equipment. The VA also released plans for a $7 million expansion and equipment upgrade for the hospital's sterilization department. Investigators from Veterans Affairs and private companies spent the last month testing the hospital's sterilization process and determined the spots or corrosive pits on surgical trays were caused by "metallic etching from chemical reactions occurring at the atomic level," according to a statement released by the hospital. Sterilizing machines and equipment were replaced or fixed and any problems were resolved, according to hospital officials. The VA has not released the total cost of the shutdown and investigation. The director of the medical center earlier said the price had reached into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Haute cuisine is to hospital food as coq au vin is to mystery meat, right? Maybe once, but a number of hospitals are breaking the old Jell-O mold, blending feeling better with tasting better as they liven up patient menus with the likes of fresh blood oranges and shrimp scampi. The movement toward tastier -- and often more nutritious -- hospital food even has reached the Culinary Institute of America, the well-known school for chefs north of New York City, which is offering a first-of-its-kind course on cooking for health care patients. Students in the elective class are taking field trips to nearby Vassar Brothers Medical Center and to Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan. The idea is to learn first-hand the nuances of tray lines, the challenges of serving people with severe dietary restrictions and what goes into creating higher-end hospital food.
A man who says he was tackled and arrested for no reason by police at Stroger Hospital while on his way to a doctor's appointment has filed a lawsuit against the hospital in Cook County Circuit Court. James Spidle, 56, alleges in the lawsuit that he had just walked into the hospital to see his cardiologist about 9:20 a.m. Aug. 9 when he noticed two people arguing near the door. As Spidle walked past them, an officer with Stroger's police force began yelling at him, the complaint states. According to the lawsuit, Spidle told the officer he had done nothing wrong and attempted to continue to his appointment, prompting the officer to say, "You're going to show me your ID if I have to lock (you) up." When Spidle attempted to walk away, several police officers jumped on his back and forced him to the ground, according to the lawsuit. Spidle alleges that the officers then stomped on his chest, dragged him to the hospital's security office, grabbed him by the neck and slammed him face first into the floor.