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The feds want Oregon to repay $74 million due to the state's problems with Cover Oregon Ocare program. They got too much money from the feds for their dual eligibles.
Humana is getting out of OCare business. In the process they have lost 2450 jobs by cutting 1500 and letting attrition take care of the rest.
The VA is again showing why it can not be trusted. They have failed to report 90% of providers to the NPDB who have been removed from clinical practice due to clinical errors. Top
In yet another snafu, the VA is Jackson, Mississippi, has been paying Dr. Mohamed Eleaky his annual salary of almost $340,000 even though he has been barred from treating patients. He is on the staff after a peer review board examined the care of a patient and said the local officials did not prove their claims. This is common for the VA to pay physicians on admin leave instead of firing them.
Long Beach, California, Community Hospital will close soon. The hospital that opened in 1924 is doomed due to seismic retrofit laws. The hospital sits on a large fault and can not be retrofitted to meet the standards by June 2019. There are adequate ED and hospital facilities nearby to handle the closure of Community.
Tenet is losing a lot of money. They ended their latest quarter losing $367 million on revenue of $4.6 billion. They will layoff many and re-negotiate contracts. The for profit investors will be ousting the Board.
Kaiser is the opposite of Tenet. Their recent quarter showed a 13% rise in revenue over the prior year. They had added about 1 million new subscribers. They had an operating income of $850 million and an net income of $1.3 Billion.
Hospitals are very lax in security of patient identification under HIPAA. Every year there are large amounts of patient information exposed by hospitals. An average data breach costs the hospital about $3.6 million each time they are hacked. They never studied Deming who said do it once and do it right.
The VA is going to use Cerner EMR at a cost to taxpayers of at least $18 BILLION. The say it will only by $10 BILLION but all know that is too cheap. It will be implemented in 48 phases and may be linked to the DOD EMR.
Summa Health and Western Reserve Hospital Partners planned on co-running the Cuyahoga Falls Hospital but have fought bitterly over the institution. The parties have now signed a truce (letter of intent) saying Summa will sell its 40% interest to a third party and all litigation will be dropped.
Children's Hospital Colorado is getting well deserved bad press. They charged an extra $1,877.86 for an ear piercing done in conjunction with a freed frenulum procedure. This extra procedure was offered by the employed surgeon who would do the tie tie procedure. No one was told of the extreme cost. The insurance rightly would not pay and the hospital came after the mother. This is wasteful medical care equivalent to other medical wasteful procedures that are not needed. After much shaming Children's finally removed the onerous charge. Top
The times they are a changing. Now only 47% of physicians own a stake in a private practice, down from 57% in 2000. Very few new physicians want to have an equity stake and when they do they go alternative such as concierge. They are the ones that do not want to be owned by a hospital.
This medical student is through. Alex Zhang a medical student at the University of Miami has been accused of posting pictures of classmates on the web without their permission. This may not be a crime but it is certainly enough to have concerns about his going on in medicine. Top
DISCLAIMER: Although this
article is updated periodically, it reflects the author's point of view at the
time of publication. Nothing in this article constitutes legal advice. Readers
should consult with their own legal counsel before acting on any of the
information presented.