Category: “Healthcare”

The information also revealed which diagnostic radiology providers earned the most Medicare dollars in 2012:

1. Dr. Angelo Makris, Alexandria, VA -- $5.6 million
2. Dr. Paul Svigals, Cherry Hill, NJ -- $5.1 million
3. Dr. Stephen Liu, Modesto, CA -- $4.6 million
4. Dr. Thanh Van, Houston -- $3.6 million
5. Dr. Anthony Becker, Fresno, CA -- $3.5 million
6. Dr. Robert Ivker, West Orange, NJ -- $3.5 million
7. Dr. William Kelly, Palm Desert, CA -- $3 million
8. Dr. John Rigney, Chappaqua, NY -- $3 million
9. Dr. Patrick Browning, Sacramento, CA -- $2.9 million
10. Dr. Richard Gray, Washington, DC -- $2.8 million
11. Dr. Melvin Rosenblatt, Fairfield, CT -- $2.8 million

Important charts and information on Medicare Expansion, ACO locations, and readmission rates across the US

There are just some things that are incompatible – like oil and water, communism and capitalism. We may be finding out that ACA’s goal to reduce healthcare costs and the consolidation of providers that is occurring because of the law may be two such incompatible things as well. Several studies are showing that the large, integrated healthcare systems are using their size and influence to drive out completion and set reimbursement rates with insurance companies.

In what could be a bellwether for healthcare under ACA, Community Health Systems has seen a major downturn in admissions and revenue. CHS, a Fortune 500 company, is the largest non-urban hospital owner. CHS operates 206 hospitals in 29 states.

Dignity Health is the brand new name for Catholic Healthcare West and operates hospitals in 17 states. Dignity Health is the fifth largest hospital system in the US and the largest not-for-profit provider in California. Dignity Health was founded in 1986 by the Sisters of Mercy.

Tenet continues to expand its imaging centers and is now expanding by buying and building urgent-care centers, free-standing emergency rooms and physician clinics. It also will add surgery centers in current locations and those where it doesn't yet have a presence.

In some new systems where doctors are reviewed by patients, physicians unwilling to supply addicts with pain pills receive poor patient-satisfaction feedback. That is judged as poor performance by hospital administrators

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) promotes Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) and the bundling of payments across providers for an episode of care (“bundled payments”), both of which encourage consolidation between hospitals and physician practices.

The American Medical Association fought a 35-year battle against the release of this data. Guess they don’t believe in transparency either. Routine office visits accounted for the single largest share of Medicare physician billings in 2012 even though they amounted to just one-seventh of the $77 billion paid by the government for physician services through the nation's senior citizen healthcare program.

"The president's budget directly counteracts the administration's efforts to reduce healthcare costs and encourage advanced manufacturing in communities across our country by instituting a burdensome prior authorization system," said MITA Executive Director Gail Rodriguez. "Inserting a bureaucratic middleman between physicians and patients will limit seniors' access to diagnostic services, while resulting in wasteful healthcare spending and fewer investments in research and development."

"Most hospital systems have a mission statement that says we exist to deliver care to patients," says James, Intermountain's chief quality officer. "Yet, if you apply the old litmus test, 'You manage what you measure,' you'll find that the role of administration in most healthcare organizations is to manage a facility within which independent physicians deliver care. Leaders vigorously track budgets and variance reports. But those reports are typically organized around departments within a hospital—versus the care that is delivered by that hospital."