Sunday, July 27, 2008

All hospitals have to pull their weight on uncompensated care

Tim Walters filed this op-ed piece Saturday in the Cleveland Plain Dealer: All hospitals have to pull their weight on uncompensated care. Seems MetroHealth, the nationally recognized public hospital in town, is in perilous financial condition. It is the largest provider of uncompensated health care in the state of Ohio, and if it goes under, Walters wonders what will happen to indigent patients

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

5th Circuit's decision in Poliner is out

Total win for Presbyterian/THR/medical-staff docs. HCQIA immunity for money damages held to apply to emergency suspension decisions during the fact-investigation phase of the peer-review process. Judge Higginbotham's opinion for a unanimous panel is here. It looks bullet-proof to me . . . . Pretty amazing saga, which I am sure won't be over until there's a petition for reconsideration/rehearing

Monday, July 21, 2008

Trying to Save by Increasing Doctors’ Fees

Trying to Save by Increasing Doctors’ FeesThat's the headline in this morning's New York Times' story about health plans (including Medicare) that are going to try to gin up some extra compensation for primary and preventive care in the hope that it will reduce more costly acute care down the road. Could it be? The dawning of the Age of Common Sense? Stay tuned . . .

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Making Malpractice a Criminal Matter

The Wall Street Journal's Law Blog has an entry today on a criminal case brought against a physician at the Harvard School of Public Health. The case is described a little more fully in the Boston Globe. According to the Globe story, the physician -- Dr. Rapin Osathanondh -- was performing an abortion on a 22-year-old woman who died during the procedure. Dr. Osathanondh was subsequently charged