As prospects fade for a public option as part of healthcare reform, key senators are considering member-owned, nonprofit health cooperatives to create competition for private insurers. Cooperatives, however, would face potentially greater difficulty getting off the ground and obtaining discounted rates from doctors and hospitals, some observers say.
The White House has indicated that it could accept a nonprofit healthcare cooperative as an alternative to a new government insurance plan, but the co-op idea is so ill defined that no one knows exactly what it would look like or how effectively it would compete with commercial insurers, according to the New York Times. Under co-ops, the government would offer start-up money in loans and grants to help doctors, hospitals, businesses, and other groups form nonprofit cooperative networks to provide healthcare and coverage.
Although President Obama has made healthcare his top priority and says the cost of Medicare and Medicaid is "the biggest threat" to the nation's fiscal future. he has not named anyone to lead the agency that runs the two giant programs. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is the largest buyer of healthcare in the United States. If it had an administrator, that person would be working with Congress on legislation and could be preparing the agency for a new, expanded role, the New York Times notes.
Boston-based Caritas Christi Health Care is set to disclose that it is selling a laboratory business to Quest Diagnostics Inc. for an undisclosed price and will use the company's technology to help manage medical records at Caritas hospitals. The deal is part of a larger effort by Caritas to cut costs and boost efficiency at its six Eastern Massachusetts hospitals.
Longer days, lower pay, less prestige, and more administrative headaches have turned doctors away in droves from family medicine.
The number of U.S. medical school students going into primary care has dropped 51.8% since 1997, according to the American Academy of Family Physicians. And if Congress passes health care legislation that extends insurance coverage to a significant part of the 47 million Americans who lack insurance, the need for more doctors is going to escalate.
Developers of a North Dallas medical complex have lined up the sales of two more tracts for new buildings. The Westmount Health Campus already has a new hospital, and other construction is planned. Westmount Realty Capital sold an almost 7-acre tract on the east side of North Central to Forest Park Realty Partners III, a group of physicians and investors. The same buyers also optioned 3.8 acres of adjoining land.