• US Supreme Court Rebuffs UnitedHealth Group Challenge on Medicare Overpayments (Medscape/Reuters)

• Buy and Bust: When Private Equity Comes for Rural Hospitals (KHN)

• FTC notches another antitrust win as HCA Healthcare, Steward Health Care call off 5-hospital sale (Fierce Health)

• Medicare, Beneficiaries Saw Higher Prices at Provider-Based Facilities (Rev Cycle)

• Opinion: Did performance-based nursing home payments meet their match with COVID? (The Hill)

• NJ nursing home labor shortage keeps getting worse (New Jersey 101.5)

• Federal Bill Aims to Free Up Nursing Homes Facing Education ‘Lockouts’ Triggered By CMPs (Skilled Nursing News)

• AHA to CMS: Proposed inpatient, LTCH payment updates ‘woefully inadequate’ (AHA)

• Inpatient volume expected to grow 2% in 10 years, SG2 report says (ACDIS)

• Report Summary (PDF)

• Medicare Advantage Represents a Growing Share of Medicare Enrollment (Health Payer)

• Enrollment Map (Better Medicare)

• Kentucky region’s hospital emergency rooms are dealing with an influx of teens seeking mental health treatment (Northern Kentucky Tribune)

• New Guideline for In-Hospital Care of Diabetes Says Use CGMs (Medscape)

• Rise of Telehealth Fraud (National Law Review)

• Half of Hospitals Have Implemented No Price Transparency (Physician's Weekly)

• Oregon State Hospital's proposed safety fixes unacceptable, CMS says (Beckers)

• Hospitals win SCOTUS case against 340B rate cuts (Health Care Dive)

• Maryland Hospital All-Payer Model: Can It Be Emulated?(Health Affairs)

• Betting on 'Golden Age' of Colonoscopies, Private Equity Invests in Gastro Docs (Medscape/KHN)

• George Washington University has sold its 20 percent minority interest of George Washington University Hospital to Universal Health Services, making the health system the sole owner of the hospital. (Beckers)

• CMS extends annual postpartum Medicaid, CHIP coverage to 4 states (Fierce Health)

• Study: High cost of cancer care in the U.S. doesn’t reduce mortality rates (EurekaAlert!)

• Pediatric suicide attempts by poisoning on the rise, study says (The Hill)

• St. Vincent workers who declined COVID-19 vaccine sue hospital for religious discrimination (Indianapolis Star on MSN)

• In Minneapolis, a mobile van rolls out with health care outreach to kids (Star Tribune)

• Home Health Providers’ Referral Acceptance Rate Has Decreased by 15% (Home Health News)

• Creating a Patient-Centered Clinical Experience (Harvard Business Review)

• Hospital Prices 224% Higher for Private Payers than Medicare (Rev Cycle)

• Concerning Spike in Barrett's Esophagus, Esophageal Cancer in Middle-Age Adults (MedPage Today)

• How Public Health Failed America (The Atlantic)

• 'Robotic surgery improves patient recovery time (EurekaAlert!)

• MedStar Washington Hospital Center is 1st in (D.C.) region to perform robotic heart surgery (WTOP)

• Bane of My Existence:' The Burden of Medicare Advantage Denials (Medcape)

• Report:Some Medicare Advantage Organization Denials of Prior Authorization Requests Raise Concerns About Beneficiary Access to Medically Necessary Care

• Immunotherapy after bladder cancer surgery shows excellent cancer-free survival rates (MedicalXpress)

• Most Men With Low-Risk Prostate Tumors Now Forgoing Treatment (Medscape)

• Why at-home COVID-19 tests may limit the way the U.S. tracks new cases (Market Watch/MSN)

• South Carolina's certificate-of-need reform legislation dies (Becker’s)

• South Carolina hospitals pushing for reform on certificate of need process (WBTW)

• Up to 14M enrollees could lose Medicaid coverage as states restart eligibility checks (Fierce Health)

• U.S. Supreme Court to weigh private lawsuits over federal nursing home rules (Reuters)

• States pay close attention as Massachusetts blocks hospital expansions to control health care costs (MSN/Kaiser)

• Negotiating Lower Hospital Prices as a Self-Insured Employer (Harvard Business review)

• Downsized City Sees Its Health Care Downsized as Hospital Awaits Demolition (KHN)

• Transitional care practice helps reduce healthcare costs (NewsMedical)

• Association Between Hospital Private Equity Acquisition and Outcomes of Acute Medical Conditions Among Medicare Beneficiaries (Jama Network)

• FAH Requests Hospital Merger Guideline Consistency from DOJ, FTC (RevCycle)

• Three patient deaths, and many others in misery, prompts $250,000 in fines at 5 Mass. nursing homes (Boston Globe)

In the News

Blogs We Follow

Popular Site Destinations

Job Bank

No current postings at AHPA

Federal Agency Blogs

COVID-19 Information

Starting Points:

• U. S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC)
• Cases, Data & Surveillance
• Covide Science Updates (Weekly)
• State Health Departments
• NACCHO Directory Local Health Departments
• CMS Nursing Home Covid Data
• GAO Coronavirus Oversight

Guides & Resources for Workspaces:

• Kaiser Permanente Articles & Business Resources
• CDC Workplaces and Businesses
• Summary of CDC guidelines on reopening businesses after the pandemic (Tech Republic)

Additional Resources:

• Center for Healthcare Quality and Payment Reform (CHQPR) Report Summary on Pandemic and Rural Hospital Closure Risk
• Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) (Medscape)
• CDC’s COVID-19 Vaccination Program Interim Playbook for Jurisdiction Operations
• The Costs of Coronavirus (JAMA Network)
• Largest COVID-19 contact tracing study to date finds children key to spread, evidence of superspreaders (Princeton)
• Evidence-Based Practice for Public Health Emergency Preparedness and Response (National Acadamies 2020)
• National Insitutes of Health
• John Hopkins ABX Guide: Coronavirus COVID-19
• The Covid Tracking Project (Tracking ended 3/7/2021):
• University Of Minnesotta CIDRAP Covid Resources
• JAMA Sponsored Live Stream Q & A with CDC
• Kaiser Family Foundation COVID-19 News and Reports
• NEJM : A collection of articles and other resources on the Coronavirus (Covid-19)
• Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME): COVID-19 Resources
• Penn Center for Research on Coronavirus and Other Emerging Pathogens Webinars (You Tube Channel)

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