A month after giving notice that they were moving their UPMC Mercy practice to rival West Penn Hospital, six obstetrics/gynecology physicians abruptly were locked out of their University of Pittsburgh Medical Center-owned offices. During the next month, the doctors' patients did not know how to contact them, the doctors did not have new offices ready to see patients and UPMC prevented them from telling their patients what had happened. Patients are now decrying UPMC for not allowing physicians to contact them.
Hollywood, CA-based Memorial Regional Hospital has launched a 15-year expansion plan that will include a new Joe DiMaggio Children's Hospital, parking garage and power facility. Since winning city approval for the controversial expansion, the South Broward Hospital District has made 32 offers to homeowners in order to make way for the project. While 19 homeowners have accepted at an average sales price of $318,000, a small group of homeowners have appeared before the City Commission to complain the offers are too low.
Nearly 20 percent of physicians are working part time versus about 13 percent two years ago, according to a survey of nearly 14,000 doctors by Cejka Search. Experts say the change has been driven by necessity because as the need for doctors grows, hospitals and physician practices are becoming more flexible. But despite the growing acceptance, drawbacks still exist for physicians who work part-time.
Exactly half of the 246 graduating students from Louisiana State University's medical schools will be staying in Louisiana, according to figures. This is an encouraging sign for healthcare in storm-battered south Louisiana, because studies have shown most doctors practice where they complete their residencies. Fledgling doctors will also be converging on New Orleans from across the country to begin their postgraduate study as well as help the region recover from Hurricane Katrina's damage to the medical system.
JPS Hospital has unveiled its new five-story patient tower that is the first major addition to the taxpayer-supported hospital's main Fort Worth, TX, campus since 1991. The tower's amenities include 108 private patient rooms with computers and advanced medical equipment mounted on the ceiling. There are also twelve operating suites, each outfitted with a 42-inch plasma screen and multiple cameras that can wirelessly send video feeds to other parts of the hospital. JPS is spending about $93 million on the tower and a seven-level parking garage.
Franklin Regional Medical Center in Louisburg, NC, is facing the threat of losing critical federal health insurance payments if it does not correct unspecified problems with care. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid have given the medical center until March 30, 2008, to correct the problems. The facility is already under criticism from residents who oppose its plans to relocate near more affluent residents in Wake County, NC.
A San Francisco transplant surgeon accused of hastening the death of a man so his organs could be harvested has been ordered to trial on one count of felony dependent adult abuse. The criminal case against Hootan Roozrokh, MD, is the first such action against a transplant doctor in the United States.
As many as 4,000 registered nurses are expected to begin a 10-day strike at eight California hospitals operated by Sutter Health. This is the third action in six months against Sutter Health hospitals by nurses represented by the California Nurses Association. Management and unionized nurses remain in dispute over contract negotiations that began in spring 2007.
California regulators have fined Cedars-Sinai Medical Center $25,000 in connection with a series of safety lapses in which incorrect doses of the blood-thinner heparin were given to children. Cedars was one of 11 California hospitals assessed penalties because of license violations that caused, or were likely to cause, serious injury or death.
The Asian Pacific American Legal Center in Los Angeles has released a study documenting the language barriers faced by nearly one in three Los Angeles County residents, or 2.5 million people. The data show that most of residents in five of the county's eight service planning areas--which are used to plan and deliver health and social services--speak a language other than English at home. Immigrant advocates say that scores of patients fall through the cracks, resulting in delayed care, misdiagnoses and unnecessary procedures leading in some cases to death.
