As legislative leaders in Prince George, MD, return to the capital, they say that a long-term solution for Dimension Health is at the top of their priority list. Dimensions Health, the county's troubled hospital system, has been losing money and on the edge of closure for years. Last year, a deal between state and local leaders on a plan to create a hospital authority that would take over from Dimensions fell apart on the final day of the session.
The escape of Kelvin D. Poke from Laurel (MD) Regional Hospital prompted scrutiny of how prisoners are guarded in hospitals. Poke's was the second escape from Laurel Regional Hospital since November, and the two incidents have rattled the Prince George's County Council member who represents Laurel, and led a correctional officers union representative to call for keeping guns out of hospitals.
Beginning late next year, Maryland will become the first state to give consumers independent evaluations of Preferred Provider Organization health plans offered by four of the state's largest healthcare providers. Consumers will be able to get information about the quality of care offered by a PPO health-plan provider, the number of complaints received and how customers are treated.
Obstetrician Jodie Rai has partnered with researcher Robert Kokenyesi to form Cervimark LLC, based at the Nidus Center for Scientific Enterprise incubator in Creve Coeura, MO. Cervimark aims to develop a test that will predict which women are likely to deliver at less than 37 weeks of pregnancy, the definition of a pre-term birth. If Cervimark succeeds, its test would allow doctors to intervene in the limited ways available to them--by moving rural patients closer to hospitals with neonatal intensive care units, for example--and would identify a group of patients who could be tapped as volunteers for clinical trials in the development of new and better treatments.
Presbyterian Hospital in Charlotte, NC has established second-opinion clinics to allow cancer patients to speak with doctors, nurses, social workers and nutritionists in a single day, at the same place, instead of making individual appointments that could take weeks or months to arrange. Several times a month, doctors from various cancer specialties--medical oncology, surgical oncology, radiation oncology and pathology--meet at to review cases of patients who want second opinions or advice about diagnoses and treatment. For now, the service is free regardless of income, but later in 2008, Presbyterian may begin charging for the clinics.
The historic new trust intended to pay the health costs of United Auto Workers retirees from Detroit's automakers could run out of money much sooner than anticipated. Thanks to two key problems: possibly inaccurate assumptions about the growth of healthcare costs, and $36 billion of the plan is unfunded so far. Industry experts say the scant public information about the trust--known as a voluntary employees' beneficiary association, or VEBA--provides little comfort that current benefits will remain as promised for hundreds of thousands of UAW retirees.
Cleveland Clinic's recent declarations that it wants to benefit the community have been called by detractors a savvy business strategy and by advocates, altruistic. The health system has put into place new initiatives--from helping residents cope with a statewide ban on smoking in workplaces, bars, and restaurants to taking out a full-page advertisement about community benefits--at a time when questions have been raised about whether it provides enough charity care to earn its tax-exempt status.
Nearly five dozen hospitals filed suit this week seeking to overturn a state rule that allows general surgeons to open physician-owned surgery centers without going through the state's healthcare planning process. Under the new rule, general surgeons who focus on abdominal surgeries are classified as a "single specialty." Single-specialty surgery centers that are located in a doctor's office are exempt from the state's certificate of need laws. The hospitals argue that the ruling never intended general surgeons to classify for the exemption.
One of Indianapolis' oldest heart surgery practices is considering closing its doors to avoid paying off in full a large court judgment from losing a breach-of-contract lawsuit brought by a former partner. Cardiac & Vascular Surgery Associates is already in a Chapter 11 reorganization bankruptcy. The court awarded the former partner $480,853 in damages after a two-and-a-half-day trial. With interest the claim could top $1 million.
The California assembly has approved legislation, backed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez, which will provide medical coverage to about 70 percent of Californians who are permanently uninsured. The state legislature is to reconvene, and voters would be asked to approve taxes that would help pay for the $14.5 billion annual tab.