Healthcare Administration news from FierceHealthcare

Of late, state and federal regulators have been challenging non-profit hospitals to prove they deserve their tax exemption. Hospital associations, health systems and individual facilities have responded by aggressively touting their estimates of the community benefit and levels of uncompensated care that they provide.

This exercise is important for all U.S. non-profits, but there's even more at …

While the evidence for cost-savings seems a bit, well, ambiguous, CMS this week is trumpeting the results of the first year of its diabetes care P4P project. CMS has just completed the first year of a three-year demonstration project under which the agency is monitoring diabetes care provided by 10 large medical practices. Diabetes management is being measured by standards drawn from CMS's Doctor's Office Quality project. Under the terms of the demonstration, which was mandated by …

Traditionally, hospitals have strictly limited families' contacts with seriously-ill patients in their intensive-care units. Of late, however, a small but growing number of hospitals are adopting a new model, under which hospitals invite patients to live with their vulnerable family members and assist in their care. This trend is spurred, in part, by a growing family-centered care movement backed by an expanding body of supporting research.

Emory University Hospital, for example, …

While nurse turnover can cost hospitals as much as $5.4 million per year, hospital executives typically are working harder on other issues, including quality improvement, reimbursement problems and uncompensated care, a new study shows. The Pricewaterhouse Cooper study, which included data from 237 hospital respondents, found nurse and physician staffing were sixth and seventh, respectively, on a list of key issues cited. On average, executives reported temporary nurses were staffing an …

Virtually every hospital faces at least some issues in working with immigrants who don't speak English. That's particularly true in states that face a particularly large flow of new immigrants, like California. Hospitals there are responding with new programs to meet the steadily increasing demand.

At UC Davis Medical Center, for example, they're handling the problem by establishing a special program designed to connect bilingual nurses with patients who need them. Under the …

While hospital-acquired methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections are nasty, a new MRSA strain emerging outside of hospitals is proving to be even more lethal. This newer MRSA strain, community-associated MRSA, is often spread in prisons and on athletic teams , both of which bring people into close physical contact and involve sharing personal items like towels, …

While posting prices online is fine, it may not necessarily help patients choose the best value for their dollar, critics say. While lower prices may suggest a hospital is more efficient--and getting patients well faster--that's not necessarily the case, advocates note. In addition, the rash of hospital prices being posted vary widely; for example, some hospitals quote their median fee paid to contracted health plans, while others quote "sticker prices" that don't really give a sense of a …

On at least one floor of Montefiore Medical Center, quiet reigns. Rather than enduring the incessant noise of beepers, squeaking carts and loud conversations, patients on the fifth floor of Montefiore enjoy near-silence. The newly low decibel levels are thanks to a program known as Silent Hospitals Help Healing, or SHHH. The program was started two years ago by the nurse manager of the floor, Elodia Mercier, when she noticed that patients' number one complaint was how noisy their stay …

The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) is poised to implement a new policy banning physicians and other employees from accepting virtually any type of pharma or device-maker freebies. If it moves ahead, UPMC would join a growing list of academic medical centers and other facilities that have instituted tight controls on such gifts. Employees and physicians who break the rules could face written reprimands and even loss of hospital privileges.

To address concerns raised …

Continuing its ongoing investigation of heart transplant programs, CMS has threatened three more programs with decertification. CMS has given San Antonio, Texas-based Christus Santa Rosa Hospital-Medical Center, Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis and St. Vincent Indianapolis Hospital 30 days to submit corrective action plans. Meanwhile, a fourth heart transplant program at the University of Kentucky Chandler Hospital has agreed to give up Medicare funding entirely, at least for …