Healthcare Companies

Catholic Healthcare West, which operates 42 hospitals across California, Arizona and Nevada, has set plans to spend $9 billion on capital projects over the next 10 years. CHW plans to use the money to build new hospitals, add seismic improvements to hospitals in earthquake zones, add health information technology and buy new clinical equipment, as well as making acquisitions where it makes sense. This plan, which would allocate $900 million for each year, represents a big jump in spending …

In a deal which should create the nation's largest publicly-traded hospital operator, Community Health Systems has agreed to buy Triad Hospitals for about $6.8 billion, including $5.1 billion upfront and the assumption of $1.7 billion in debt. HCA used to be the nation's top publicly-held hospital firm, but it was taken private in a $33 billion leveraged buyout last year. In agreeing to …

Contending that the buy would unfairly lock up the Nevada market, the American Medical Association has asked the U.S. Department of Justice to block a planned UnitedHealth Group acquisition. UHG had announced last week that it would acquire Las Vegas, NV-based Sierra Health Services, a $1.7 billion company which operates managed care plans throughout Nevada. The AMA is asking the DOJ to stop $2.6 billion deal, arguing that it would represent an "alarming" consolidation of the state's HMO …

A large California health purchasing group is joining hands with some of the state's large health plans and Medicare to produce report cards on individual physician performance. The effort, which is led by the Pacific Business Group on Health (PBGH), will draw data from Medicare, Blue Cross Blue Shield of California and PacifiCare/UnitedHealth to create the report cards. The effort is part …

Two former Siemens executives pled guilty this week rigging a $49 million contract to provide equipment to a Cook County (Illinois) hospital. To engineer the fraud the two execs, Daniel P. Desmond and Ellen Roth, had claimed they were following rules for fostering a minority participation in their contract with the county's John H. Stroger hospital. In their bid, two claimed they had joint-ventured with a minority partner which would share 30 percent of profits from the deal. In reality, …

Convinced, at long last, that smart disease management saves more money than creating financial barriers to care, some employers have begun to give away the drugs needed to treat common chronic conditions. In the past, employers have increasingly tried to cut healthcare costs by asking employees to pay higher premiums and out-of-pocket costs. Now, some employers have decided that it's cheaper to give away the drugs that treat expensive, lingering diseases like diabetes, high blood …

Under pressure from varied interest groups, Merck has agreed to stop lobbying state legislatures in an effort to get them to mandate the HPV vaccine for young girls. Through a third party, Merck had been funding a campaign to have states require the its HPV vaccine Gardasil for 11- and 12-year-old girls before they could attend school. And the drugmaker's efforts had been bearing fruit. Though no bill has passed yet, legislatures in 20 states are considering measures that would institute …

In a suit bringing more attention to an already-hot legal battle, Blue Shield of California has been sued by a college student whose coverage was dropped after he was hospitalized. The student has asked a Los Angeles judge to issue an injunction making the health plan stop canceling policies after people get sick and submit claims, as well as reinstate his coverage. In filing his complaint, the student only adds another stone to the pile falling on health insurers in California, many of …

Despite some high-profile black eyes in a few areas of its operations, Kaiser Permanente has had one heck of a year. The organization just reported that its nonprofit Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Kaiser Foundation Hospital and subsidiaries saw a 10 percent jump in revenue and a 30 percent rise in net income. This is good news for Kaiser, certainly, but it should also be noted that Kaiser's operating margin has fallen almost one-half over the last couple of years, from 5.3 percent in …

The Los Angeles city attorney's office has begun investigating whether staff from the city's Hollywood Presbyterian hospital dumped a paraplegic man in a gutter in front of a local mission. Security cameras recorded workers from the hospital arriving, wheeling the man on a gurney into the courtyard, then, after being challenged by the mission's security guards regarding the paraplegic's care, being wheeled back into the ambulance. Later, however, the man was found in a skid row gutter. …