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The chairman of a powerful US Senate committee has asked 20 hospital systems, including the parent company of Massachusetts General Hospital, to provide detailed records about the controversial practice of allowing surgeons to operate on more than one patient at a time. (Saltzman and Abelson, 3/13)

The Cleveland Clinic is being queried about its use of concurrent surgeries – one surgeon operating on two patients simultaneously – as part of a U.S. Senate inquiry into the effectiveness and transparency of the practice nationally, a spokeswoman at the hospital confirmed. The U.S. Senate Finance Committee has asked the Clinic to provide detailed information on how many concurrent surgeries its physicians have performed during each of the last five years, as well as internal surveys on the safety and effectiveness of the practice. (Ross, 3/15)