Hospital groups seek to use reform to regulate physician-owned hospitals

It's no secret that there's no love lost between traditionally-structured hospitals and physician-owned facilities. After all, traditional hospitals claim that the physician-owned players cherry-pick well-insured patients and leave them to care for the under- and uninsured at a loss. For years, hospital trade groups have lobbied state legislatures to put limits on these competitors, with relatively little success.

Now, groups like the American Hospital Association are trying again, this time by inserting restrictions on physician-owned hospitals into reform, according to a group representing such facilities. The group, Physician Hospitals of America, contends that the AHA and other large hospital groups have convinced the Obama administration to agree to such rules in exchange for its accepting a $155 billion rollback in Medicare reimbursement over the next years.

The PHA, which represents 220 physician-owned hospitals in 32 states, says the language included in the House reform legislation would basically kill the industry. It would bar physician-owned hospitals that didn't have Medicare Provider Numbers by January 1 of this year from getting one at all--unless, of course, the physician-owners agreed not to refer to their facilities. Obviously, its members aren't going to take that lying down.

To learn more about this power struggle:
- read this Health Leaders Media piece

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