News From Around the Web
> Chicago-area hospitals have been getting into payment disputes with insurers, leaving many patients without their familiar providers, the Chicago Tribune has reported. Article
> Dignity Health, the California-based not-for-profit hospital operator, plans to build four tiny "neighborhood hospitals" in underserved areas of Las Vegas with six to eight beds that will cost around $25 million apiece to build, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The intent is to treat less critically ill patients at sites away from Dignity's larger acute care hospitals. Article
> The potential elimination of the certificate of need process in Florida could threaten the finances of the state's safety-net hospitals, according to an opinion piece in the Florida Times-Union. Article
Provider News
> The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services explained how it arrived at the 2016 star ratings in a report describing its methodology for calculating overall hospital quality. The ratings, which measure hospitals on a five-star scale, took into consideration 113 measures of inpatient and outpatient quality, according to the report. The data are derived from the the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems survey. Article
Health IT News
> Too much website traffic after the holidays was the culprit behind Kaiser Permanente site issues last week, according to the organization. The 20 percent jump in visits to the website created "load-balancing issues," the San Francisco Business Times reported. Article
And finally... Jewelry made from breast milk. Article