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Hospitals across the nation, including in Ohio, are doing a better job of slowing the revolving door of hospital readmissions, new federal data show. Ohio is one of 49 states reporting declines of patient readmissions, and among 11 where percentages fell by more than 10 percent between 2010 and 2015, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. (Pyle, 9/21)

Kindred Healthcare will pay a $3 million penalty and close several sites after failing to implement corrections to its billing system under a corporate integrity agreement with the federal government. It's the largest such penalty issued to date. HHS' Office of Inspector General said Tuesday that the massive post-acute care provider failed to correct improper billing practices during the fourth year of its five-year corporate integrity agreement, stemming from a prior $25 million False Claims Act settlement with Gentiva Healthcare. Kindred acquired Gentiva in February 2015 in a $1.8 billion deal.  (Teichert, 9/20)

Ascension is launching its largest ever advertising and marketing campaign to rebrand all of its hospitals. The national Catholic hospital giant is starting the rebranding at its hospitals and facilities in Michigan and Wisconsin, then gradually rolling it out to the rest of the country, said Ascension CEO Anthony Tersigni. The effort, Tersigni said, is aimed at getting patients and employees thinking about Ascension as a system that offers care locally but with the clinical and financial backing of the nation's largest not-for-profit hospital company. (Barkholz, 9/20)

Ascension Wisconsin will soon begin taking steps to make clear its status as the state’s second-largest health system. The health system will adopt the Ascension name for the hospitals, clinics and other operations of its four health systems in the state. With the name change, which will take place over the next 12 to 18 months, Wheaton Franciscan’s St. Joseph Hospital will become Ascension St. Joseph Hospital, for example, and Columbia St. Mary’s will become Ascension Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital. (Boulton, 9/20)

Reflecting a growing trend in health care, John Muir Health and UC San Francisco Health are teaming up to open a new outpatient center in Berkeley as soon as 2018. The 100,000-square-foot facility will be located in West Berkeley and offer urgent care and primary care practices staffed by John Muir physicians. There will also be specialty physicians from both John Muir and UCSF, imaging and lab services. (Ioffee, 9/20)

Children’s Mercy Hospital is partnering with Olathe Medical Center to provide pediatric urgent care and specialty clinics at an as-yet unbuilt facility on OMC’s 250-acre campus at 151st Street and Interstate 35. The partnership is the first between the two hospitals. It will allow Olathe Medical Center to take advantage of the wide range of expertise that Children’s Mercy has in treating children, especially those with complex medical conditions. “It ties in with our vision of providing a full continuum of care on the Olathe Medical Center campus,” Olathe Medical Center CEO Frank H. Devocelle said in an email. “We will be able to offer an enhanced level of services for children. (Margolies, 9/20)