NEW NEWS - CLASS 8
HCA
HCA (Nashville) owns or operates 191 hospitals, including seven operated
as 50-50 joint ventures. HCA's profits rise, compared with its 2002 figures
when HCA took a $603 million charge to settle a federal investigation of HCA's
Medicare billing (Modern Healthcare 2-030-4)
11/01: According to a study supported by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Hospital CEO's views of health care competition influence their choice of physician-organization integration strategies. See: "CEO Perceptions of Competition and Strategic Response in Hospital Markets," by Jeffrey A. Alexander, Ph.D. Lawton R. Burns, Ph.D. et al. (June, 2001) Medical Care Research and Review.
10/29/01: Per amednews.com: "Ohio Doctors Sue Over Debt Repayment Responsibility," with subtitle "Physicians Say They are Unfairly Being Asked to Pay Back Part of the Group's Debt. Hospital Organization says the Lawsuit is Without Merit," indicates 23 Toledo, Ohio doctor, part of Mercy Health System Physician Hospital Organization (PHO) are suing their PHO accusing the PHO of unjustly trying to make them help pay back a portion of the PHO's debt. The doctors claim that the PHO is asking them to pay back $4.2 million of $22 million the PHO has lost over the past couple of years. The doctors appear to claim that the hospital lost the money and the hospital portion of the PHO disagrees. The PHO is set up as risk pool and the doctors were given a fee schedule and received a "revised product description" in July, 2001 that required the physicians to make payments for their "proportionate share of the debt" and increased their share of the debt to 50% from 33% and reduced their compensation by 2.41%. The hospital portion of the organization claimed that the decision to reduce physicians' compensation was board approved by the physicians own representatives elected to the governing board of the organization and that the reduction is based on the physician portion of medical losses experienced over two years in the risk pool in which the physicians participated. Only a small portion of the 600-plus physicians who are part of the PHO put their name on the lawsuit and the physician side said that was because some of the physicians were risk adverse and were afraid of the fallout if they were to join the lawsuit.
6/12/01: According to the article "Evanston Northwestern's Finances Looking Quite Healthy" by Bruce Japsen in the Chicago Tribune, Evanston Northwestern owns Evanston Hospital, Glenbrook Hospital in Glenview, and Highland Park Hospital.
Though, many Illinois hospitals have been "squeezed by flat inpatient payments from the federal-state Medicaid health insurance program for the poor and an increase in patients who have no insurance at all."
Evanston Northwestern has healthy finances despite financial pressures from reductions in spending on Medicare, the federal health insurance program for the elderly.
Only 36% of gross revenues derive from Medicare and only 3% derive from Medicaid at Evanston Northwestern. A large 50% is generated from managed care payers for the young affluent service area of this Hospital system.
From Crain's Chicago Business, "Doctors Begin Advocate Exodus," by Sarah A. Klein (August 14, 2000): 3 and 78.
The subtitle to this article is "Protest is the start of more physician group divorces". This article describes how close to 20%, about 40, of the physicians in Advocate Health Care's largest medical group have resigned as of the end of the year. Sources say another 20 to 30 may also resign at yearend.
The reasons for the resignations includes a protest over Advocate's attempt to reduce salaries by as much as 10% to 30%.
This article describes the reasoning initially behind various hospital's acquisitions of physician practices; that many hospitals went on a buying frenzy and purchased physician's practices at inflated rates in fear of physician practice management companies controlling physician referrals.