Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Hospital Roundup: Ransomware Attacks Worry Congress; A Rise In 'Microhospitals'
When the Obama administration pushed out a $35 billion incentive program to pay doctors and hospitals to convert to electronic records, the idea was to modernize the health care industry, not serve it up on a platter to cyber criminals. But now, American hospitals face weekly ransom threats. If they don鈥檛 pay up, files get frozen, surgeries delayed and patients sent across town. One of these days, someone could die as a result. And no one in government has a clear plan to handle it. (Allen, 7/18)
Eyeing fast-growing urban and suburban markets where demand for health care services is outstripping supply, some health care systems are opening tiny, full-service hospitals with comprehensive emergency services but often fewer than a dozen inpatient beds. These 鈥渕icrohospitals鈥 provide residents quicker access to emergency care, and they may also offer outpatient surgery, primary care and other services. They are generally affiliated with larger health care systems, which can use the smaller facility to expand in an area without incurring the cost of a full-scale hospital. (Andrews, 7/19)
The Georgia Open Records Act, known as a 鈥渟unshine law,鈥 was created to allow the people of the state to know what their government agencies are doing. Private citizens, lawyers and reporters routinely use the act to find out how agencies make decisions and spend money. But Atlanta-based Northside Hospital Inc. says it鈥檚 not bound by that law. (Miller, 7/18)
The growing number of shootings involving police is drawing hospital CEOs into the conversation on race relations. In an essay Monday on Linkedin, Kaiser Permanente CEO Bernard Tyson called for a national dialogue on race and rebuilding trust through community policing. (Barkholz, 7/18)
It鈥檚 an obscure agency with a vital role: providing in-depth research to help the state monitor and contain health care costs. But the Center for Health Information and Analysis, or CHIA, was blindsided when its budget was slashed by more than a third as part of a deal to avert a potentially nasty fight over hospital funding. Under the compromise, reached in May, Local 1199 of the Service Employees International Union dropped its push for a ballot proposal that would have yanked $440 million in annual payments from Partners HealthCare, the state鈥檚 largest health system, and redistributed much of that money to lower-paid hospitals. (McCluskey, 7/18)
Presence Health's shaky financial condition has taken a slight turn for the better after the Catholic health system reduced its workforce by more than 650 full-time jobs and increased prices in the first half of the year. But it's too early to say whether the Chicago-based company is on the road to recovery. (Sachdev, 7/18)
The family of a Florida woman who died outside a hospital after she was forcibly removed by police has filed a federal lawsuit against those who forced her exit. Frances Scott, who is the personal representative of the estate of Barbara Dawson, filed it against Calhoun Liberty Hospital, including two of its former employees, the City of Blountstown and former Blountstown Police officer. (Reedy, 7/18)
