UnitedHealth Group is testing a new model of healthcare that many policy experts say holds great promise but has yet to prove itself. Under the medical home model, the insurer will try giving doctors more authority and money than usual in return for closely monitoring their patients' progress, even when patients go to specialists or require hospitalization. The insurer will also move away from paying doctors solely on the basis of how many services they provide, and will start rewarding them more for the overall quality of care patients receive.
A Brevard County, FL, hospital system has been exchanging $100 gas cards in recent months for copies of bills showing what its competitors charge for certain medical procedures. Wuesthoff Health Systems says the price data it is accumulating will allow it to compare its rates for services and procedures covered by various health insurers. It says it also plans to make the information available on the Internet so that cost-conscious patients on the Space Coast can comparison shop before deciding where to have scheduled surgeries.
Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius is near the top of President Barack Obama's list of candidates to head the Health and Human Services Department, a senior administration official said. Other candidates, including former Clinton White House chief of staff John Podesta, remain in the mix. A decision is not imminent, a senior administration official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Christopher Gessner, president of Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh, is mystified and upset by state budgeting practices. He can't understand why his hospital is set to lose all $445,000 of its state funding in Gov. Ed Rendell's new budget, while a similar medical facility, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, is only losing $44,000. "We'll be taking a direct hit," he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "I'm puzzled. This is frustrating. All we want is parity with Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. We don't have it right now."
Both the House and Senate versions of the economic stimulus package include $20 billion for electronic medical records, a sum expected to spur the conversion to save costs, improve the quality of care and add information technology jobs, especially in the San Franciso area. While a relatively small part of President Obama's roughly $900 billion plan to jump-start the economy, the funds amount to the largest infusion of cash the health IT industry has ever seen.
Ever since Hurricane Katrina, Charity Hospital has been an emblem of misery for New Orleans. Nearly 3½ years after the flood ended, Charity is still empty. Plans to replace the hospital with a new one are stalled. Instead, Charity has become perhaps the most notable symbol of the languid pace of government efforts to rebuild or replace billions of dollars worth of public works wrecked when Katrina and Hurricane Rita hit the Gulf Coast in 2005. Among thousands of projects that still haven't moved forward, none has been as big or contentious as Charity.