Changing News Archive - November, 2009

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Leading Democrats on Sunday said they expect Congress to pass a major healthcare reform backed by President Barack Obama, but supporters may have to accept legislation that falls short on some issues.

WASHINGTON – Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has released a report  that shows the impact proposed health reform would have on residents in each state.

The report, released Monday, shows that If Congress doesn't pass healthcare reform legislation, the number of uninsured people will grow by more than 30 percent in 29 states and by at least 10 percent in every state by 2019.

Cuts in Medicare reimbursements that are likely to be part of any healthcare reform legislation could adversely impact credit ratings for hospitals and health systems across the country, particularly in urban areas, according to new analysis by Moody's Investor Service.

The study noted the conflicting goals of healthcare reform—expanding access to care while simultaneously reducing costs—could have significant negative implications for many high-cost urban hospitals, even if the number of insured patients increases.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - New electronic record systems installed in thousands of U.S. hospitals have done little to rein in skyrocketing healthcare costs, Harvard University researchers said in a study released on Friday.

A review of roughly 4,000 hospitals from 2003 to 2007 found that while many had moved away from the paper files that still dominate the U.S. healthcare system, administrative costs actually rose, even among the most high-tech institutions.

Advocates of such technology have been pushing for greater use of computerized health records to prevent costly errors and allow greater coordination among caregivers and patients. But adoption has been slow, prompting Congress to offer $19 billion in incentives as part of an economic stimulus bill.

A top federal health official said Wednesday that the controversial new guidelines for breast cancer screening do not represent government policy, as the Obama administration sought to keep the debate over mammograms from undermining the prospects for health-care reform.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, in a written statement, said the new guidelines had "caused a great deal of confusion and worry among women and their families across this country," and she stressed that they were issued by "an outside independent panel of doctors and scientists who . . . do not set federal policy and . . . don't determine what services are covered by the federal government."

LOS ANGELES – Six Los Angeles-based health foundations, health plans and healthcare providers are urging the University of California Regents to reopen the Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center.

A proposal has been made that the medical center partner with the University of California to re-open by 2012.

A majority of hospital chief executive officers say they don't have enough physicians, nurses or allied health professionals to handle increased demand if health reform improves access, according to a survey released Monday by AMN Healthcare, a large provider of clinical staffing services.

The survey, completed by 285 hospital executives, found that although there are more applicants for jobs today because of the recession, significant gaps remain. And what's worse, many of the executives believe the situation will not improve.

ANN ARBOR, MI – Thomson Reuters has released its annual study identifying the 100 U.S. hospitals that deliver significantly better outcomes and lower costs for inpatient cardiovascular care.

"100 Top Hospitals: Cardiovascular Benchmarks" examined the performance of 971 hospitals by analyzing outcomes for patients diagnosed with heart failure and heart attacks and for those who received coronary bypass surgery or percutaneous cardiovascular interventions (PCI) such as angioplasties.

The study, in its 11th year, evaluated short-term, acute care, non-federal U.S. hospitals that treat a broad spectrum of cardiology patients.

WASHINGTON – A new report by the Business Roundtable indicates key components of healthcare reform could slow the growth of healthcare costs.

The report, released Thursday, said "the right reforms" could slow healthcare growth from its current 10 percent a year to 4 percent, on pace with the Gross Domestic Product. The report shows that effective reforms could slow healthcare costs by as much as $3,000 per employee in 2019.

WASHINGTON – A new poll by the Trust for America’s Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation indicates 71 percent of Americans favor increased investment in disease prevention and that disease prevention is an integral part of healthcare reform.

According to the poll, 44 percent strongly favor investing more in prevention.

WASHINGTON – Employment in the U.S. healthcare sector increased by approximately 29,000 jobs in October, while the national unemployment rate grew to 10.2 percent, according to recent data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The biggest healthcare job gains were in ambulatory care and hospitals. Approximately 12,500 of the 29,000 new healthcare jobs were in the ambulatory care sector and 10,000 in hospitals.

Overall employment in nursing and residential care facilities increased by approximately 6,000 jobs in October.

St. Joseph's Hospital of Elmira and Guthrie Healthcare System of Sayre have called off plans to unite the two facilities under the Guthrie banner.

The two organizations are still committed to working together, as demonstrated by the number of Guthrie physicians on St. Joseph's staff, St. Joseph's spokesman Denis Sweeney said Tuesday afternoon.

"But both organizations have agreed that now is not the time to move ahead because of the economic climate and the uncertainty of the reimbursement changes in New York state and Pennsylvania," he said.

PLYMOUTH, MA – Jordan Hospital, a not-for-profit hospital in Plymouth, Mass., has installed a new denials management tool and is now using a complete revenue cycle solution product suite in its business office.

"We plan to improve our workflow by eliminating several manual processes," said Janet Wright, director of patient accounts at Jordan Hospital. "This tool gives us the real-time data we need while providing integrated workflow functions to not only fix our denials but also prevent them from happening again."

Late Wednesday, a bill that Republicans expect to offer as an alternative to the Democratic package received its assessment from congressional budget analysts, who concluded that the proposal would barely dent the ranks of the uninsured.

The measure would cover 3 million additional people at a cost of $60 billion through 2019, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. The Democrats' bill, by comparison, would cover far more -- 36 million additional Americans -- at a much higher cost -- $1.055 trillion through 2019, the CBO has said.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Americans are more likely than people in 10 other countries to have trouble getting medical treatment because of insurance restrictions or cost, an international survey of primary care doctors released on Wednesday found.

While the United States spends more than twice as much as other developed countries on healthcare, it lags well behind in key measures of quality, the annual survey found.

WASHINGTON – Most hospitals will receive in 2010 an inflation update of 2.1 percent in their payment rates for services furnished to Medicare beneficiaries in outpatient departments, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

However, as required by Medicare law, CMS will reduce the update by 2 percent for hospitals that didn't participate in quality data reporting for outpatient services or didn't report it successfully, resulting in a 0.1 percent update for those hospitals.

WASHINGTON – The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced on Oct. 30 a 21.2 percent 2010 pay cut for physicians participating in Medicare. CMS officials said they had anticipated a 21.5 percent pay cut for physicians in 2010, but new data allowed them to lower the cut to 21.2 percent.

J. James Rohack, MD, president of the American Medical Association, said the pay cut is the largest that physicians participating in Medicare have had to face. Access to care and choice of physicians for seniors is at risk unless Congress permanently fixes the payment formula, he said.

The House is expected to vote soon on legislation (H.R. 3961) to permanently repeal the current Medicare physician payment formula.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today published a guidance document that should help manufacturers develop diagnostic tests for the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus. Although there are not any FDA-approved or cleared tests that diagnose this specific infection, during this pandemic, manufacturers can submit a request to the FDA for an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). If granted, the EUA will allow the test to be used during the national public health emergency declared by Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius in April. This guidance document outlines what information the FDA recommends that manufacturers include in these EUA requests.