August, 2014

Downward pressure on the orthopedic medical device sector from reimbursement and pricing, utilization of costly procedures, increasing commoditization, and the need to drive growth, are driving mergers and acquisitions at a fast pace.

According to the Association of Healthcare Philanthropy, the average cost to raise $1 for nonprofit hospital fundraising departments is $0.35. So to generate $1 million from your fundraising operation, you need to invest $350,000. On the clinical side, with average hospital margins at 2 percent, generating $1 million from operations would require your institution to spend $980,000.

Shimadzu Medical Systems USA, has been bestowed the 2014 "Best in KLAS" achievement award for the RADspeed table system in the "digital X-ray" category five out of six years.

Health technology and electronic health records powerhouse Cerner Corp. is spending $1.3 billion to purchase Siemens Health Services, the health information technology business of Germany’s Siemens AG, Cerner announced Tuesday.

Just yesterday it was reported how well Tenet was performing under ACA. I suppose when you lose less money that's an accurate assessment. Perhaps instead of cheerleadering ACA the news should be accurately reflecting what is going on. Tenet's miniscule growth (2.6%) is attributable to acquisitions and mergers - not ACA volume growth.

When you think our business can't get any crazier it does. Siemens IT sells out. The most expensive rooms in Radiology get KLAS rating (cause I suppose money doesn't matter). Now California wants to make it harder even harder for hospitals struggling under ACA revenue constriction. CA wants not-for-profit hospitals to give more money away. Perhaps it's like the Federal government - we're in debt and borrowing 50 cents of every dollar so lets give more away. CA - good luck with that.

"The digital health markets need to develop business models that make sense while organizations are transitioning to these different care reimbursement models," said Sandra Elliott, Director, Consumer Technology and Service Development, Meridian Health. "Health and technology providers should focus on providing end-to-end scalable solutions that offer financial benefits to purchasers while showing value to patients as individuals by enabling them to live their life to the fullest, thus encouraging strong consumer engagement."

For-profit hospital operator Community Health Systems has agreed to pay more than $97 million plus interest to the federal government, settling allegations that it submitted false claims for short-stay admissions. “I think that there are a number of people in the healthcare industry who have a growing concern about corporate pressure influencing medical decision-making,” Organ said. The settlement does not end scrutiny on CHS. The government is still investigating billing practices at Health Management Associates hospitals, the former North Naples, Fla.-based hospital chain that CHS bought earlier this year.

The six systems are Aspirus in Wausau; Aurora Health Care in Milwaukee; Bellin Health in Green Bay; Gundersen Health System in La Crosse; ThedaCare in Appleton; and UW Health in Madison. Together, they comprise 44 hospitals and more than 5,600 physicians, and they provide care to about 90% of the Badger State's population, according to a release announcing the partnership.

Matt Heywood, CEO of Aspirus, said in an interview that the ultimate goal of the non-equity partnership is to migrate toward an accountable care organization. The six health systems already have started offering a commercial health plan with Anthem Blue Cross, available through the federal and private-insurance exchanges. If and when the collaborative becomes an ACO, it will aim for inclusion in more health plans as a low-cost, high-quality provider network.

"We often hear that doctors' fees are to blame for escalating healthcare costs," said Doug Ghertner, president and CEO of Change Healthcare, the market leader in consumer engagement and cost transparency. "In truth, it's the facilities that exhibit the most significant variance in costs – often varying by hundreds or even thousands of percentage points."

"The most dangerous place to be these days is a stand-alone hospital," said Michael Dowling, president and chief executive officer of North Shore-LIJ Health System, which has 16 hospitals in the New York area—and is currently negotiating with two other Westchester facilities.