Editor's Note The recent cyberattack on Change Healthcare created a financial impact for the lion’s share of US hospitals surveyed recently by the American Hospital Association, with more than half reporting “significant or serious” impact and three of every four also reporting direct impacts on patient care. These data reflect…

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Editor's Note Making good on plans announced by the Biden administration in December, federal agencies have launched a public inquiry into how private equity mergers and acquisitions impact patient outcomes, worker safety, and healthcare access and costs, including costs to taxpayers.  As reported by Dotmed Healthcare Business News on March…

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Editor's Note A new Alabama law provides civil and criminal immunity for providers and patients of in vitro fertilization (IVF) services, the Associated Press reported March 7. Last month, the Alabama Supreme Court effectively ruled that frozen embryos are people with a constitutional right to life, casting doubt on the…

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Editor's Note The ransomware group behind a recent cyberattack on one of the nation’s largest health systems has its sights set on hospitals, the FBI and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) warned February 27. According to a report in Chief Healthcare Executive one day later, systems were…

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Editor's Note More CEOs are considering rural emergency hospital (REH) designation, according to a February 12 article in Becker’s Hospital CFO Report. In January 2023, REH was established as a new Medicare provider type to enable struggling rural hospitals to continue operating with outpatient and emergency services only, instead of…

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Editor's Note “Can cost and resiliency co-exist?” Michael Schiller, CMRP, executive director (interim) of the Association for Healthcare Resources and Materials Management—a professional membership group of the American Hospital Association—asked this session’s audience on the last day of the OR Business Management Conference. “They can co-exist,” he said, “but resiliency…

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Editor's Note The US government's sale of the Federal Helium Reserve, a large underground helium stockpile in Amarillo, Texas, has raised concerns about the supply of helium for critical healthcare applications, especially MRI machines, NBC News reported January 25. The Federal Helium Reserve reportedly provides up to 30% of the…

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Editor's Note:  Stacking additional responsibilities and titles atop pre-existing leadership responsibilities is becoming more common among health system executives, according to a January 24 report in Becker’s Hospital Review. Not including the most obvious overlapping pairings, such as chief medical officer and chief medical informatics officers, the most common parings…

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Editor's Note:  Pennsylvania hospitals and health systems lost a total of $8.1 billion to COVID-19 between January 2020 and December 2022, HealthLeaders reported on January 18. In addition to illuminating the new data from The Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council and The Hospital and Healthsystem Association of Pennsylvania, the…

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Editor's Note: Rural communities are at serious risk due to hospitals’ increasing inability to offer labor and delivery services, according to a new report from the Center for Healthcare Quality & Payment Reform. Highlights include: More than half (55%) of rural hospitals in the U.S. do not offer labor and…

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