A $257 million expansion and seismic-upgrade project for Seattle-based Harborview Medical Center is now nearing completion. The project began with voter-approved bond funding of $193 million in 2000. The project will mark a new step in Harborview's competition for "elective" and short-stay surgeries and procedures that have been identified as lucrative income-generators at other hospitals, say hospital representatives.
Hospitals and other healthcare organizations widely use patient information, without patients' explicit permission, to raise funds, and fundraising to benefit medical institutions is allowed under federal law. While patients can opt out after the fact, critics say the practice of soliciting donations from current and former patients symbolizes the erosion of personal privacy in contemporary life.
Thousands of University of California hospital and campus workers have authorized a strike as early as June unless UC pays them as much as others doing the same work elsewhere. The union represents nearly 20,000 hourly wage workers across UC's five hospitals and 10 campuses. The union and UC have been negotiating for 10 months, and the union wants minimum wage increased to $15 an hour, in addition to a 25% wage increase.
Six months after the mother of Kanye West died following liposuction and breast implant surgery, California lawmakers and physicians are urging greater protections for patients undergoing cosmetic surgery. Such surgeries are increasingly done outside hospital settings in outpatient clinics, where a doctor can avoid the rigorous reviews. More than a decade ago, California pushed to regulate outpatient surgical centers amid high-profile reports that patients were critically injured or dying during procedures.
Legislators passed a law that said such centers must be accredited by an agency recognized by the state. But critics say the law has not been effective.
For the second time in three years, Soutwest Atlanta Hospital has opened with new owners. After two bankruptcies and several lawsuits, the hospital is again trying to win the faith of a community that has largely abandoned it. Many people in the community say the area needs a hospital, and they want to preserve the facilty's historic role. But years and competition and neglect drove people away from Southwest.
Registered nurses at Upland, PA-based Crozer-Chester Medical Center are calling for a strike if negotiations with management fail to produce a new contract. The nurse's present deal expires at June 4, and they have called for a three-day strike beginning June 5 if a deal is not reached. The nurses are seeking improved nurse-to-patient ratios, and are seeking resolutions to economic issues such as recruitment and retention of nurses, pension benefits, and healthcare costs.
The National Health Service has recently barred British physicians from wearing neckties, jewelry, and long sleeves, all in the name of disease prevention. Officials there are particularly concerned about antibiotic-resistant diseases such as MRSA. Some U.S. doctors find the move strange, and say there are better ways to prevent the spread of germs to patients.
There has been some controversy surrounding new legislation that would let Connecticut towns, small businesses and nonprofits join the state employees' health plan. Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is about to release a legal opinion that could blunt a major concern of Gov. M. Jodi Rell about the cost to the state, but raises uncertainty about what towns and others would end up paying for insurance. The legislation is aimed at giving towns and others access to the same rates, broad insurance benefits, and low co-payments that the state plan has.
The largest Nashville-based hospital chains have spent the past few years absorbing past acquisitions and selling off a few locations to pay down debt. But both HCA Inc. and LifePoint Hospitals Inc. have talked recently of a growing desire to do a few deals again. The renewed chatter comes as experts see a buyer's market for the big chains as smaller players face refinancing debt amid a national credit crunch. This and other factors may drive smaller healthcare groups to consider selling to the big operators, analysts say.
After about two years of battling TennCare to pay for an experimental treatment, a judge has ordered that a patient with a rare and painful disease receive care. TennCare, Tennessee’s insurance plan for the poor and disabled, has decided not to appeal. The could potentially impact thousands of others with rare diseases across the country, experts say.
