Fort Worth, TX-based John Peter Smith Hospital is seeking approval to become a Level 1 trauma center, the highest-level of accreditation that would allow the most serious injuries and illnesses to be treated at the hospital. JPS trauma services are currently at Level 2, and JPS would need to add the ability to perform cardiac bypass surgery, among other things. The process to become a Level 1 trauma center could take about a year.
Maryland law should be changed so that hospitals are required to provide charity care to more people and give financial-assistance information to all patients, according to the state's Health Services Cost Review Commission. In a report to Gov. Martin O'Malley, the Commission recommends several changes to the state's unique rate-setting system. The commission also recommended that hospitals be required to provide written notice about the availability of financial assistance to all patients before or as they are discharged, and that hospitals and their collection agencies be barred from adding interest and penalties on bills to uninsured patients for periods before court judgments are entered against them.
Amid allegations by college students that school health insurance is skimpy, Massachusetts regulators have proposed that colleges start tracking how many students rack up annual medical bills beyond what their policies cover. Under the proposal, colleges would be required to report to state regulators information such as the number of times insurers refuse to pay for student injuries or illnesses; the number of grievances students file against the companies; and the percentage of profits the companies apply toward students' medical services. Regulators said the proposal would be a first step as they consider whether to make insurers offer student plans that provide more generous benefits.
University of South Florida wants to build a freestanding, 100-bed, general acute-care hospital on its Tampa campus. USF disclosed its plan in a letter of intent to Florida's Agency for Health Care Administration, seeking a certificate of need to build the hospital. The proposed hospital would be adjacent to the Carol & Frank Morsani Center for Advanced Healthcare, a newly opened outpatient center on campus, and near the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute.
The emergency room of Santa Clara County, CA's busiest hospital was closed for more than four hours Feb. 12 because of a scare involving a man who had been overcome by a byproduct of sewer gas at his home. The 18-year-old man was brought to Santa Clara Valley Medical Center in San Jose after being found unconscious in his home. He was not decontaminated before being admitted, and at first authorities had no idea what had felled him. As a precaution, the emergency department was quarantined, and dozens of people were decontaminated.
The San Francisco Chronicle outlines the health related spending in the federal government's economic stimulus plan, including $87 billion added to Medicaid funding over the next two years; $24.7 billion to subsidize unemployed workers by 60% for up to nine months to stay on their employers' health plan; and $19 billion to modernize health information technology systems.