A for-profit company that owns three hospitals in New Jersey unveiled a new identity as an integrated health system with plans to offer a Medicaid plan and sell insurance on the state exchange about to launch under the healthcare reform law. In recent years, the Jersey City, N.J.-based company, doing business as Hudson Holdco, acquired 170-bed Bayonne (N.J.) Medical Center, 381-bed Christ Hospital in Jersey City and 204-bed Hoboken (N.J.) University Medical Center.
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CAMBRIDGE, Mass.—The Cambridge Health Alliance and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston agreed to form a clinical and academic affiliation. Cambridge Health Alliance, operated by a public authority established by the state Legislature in 1996, is composed of Cambridge Hospital and hospital campuses in Somerville and Everett, as well as the Cambridge Public Health Department. The tighter integration comes ahead of the Cambridge Health Alliance's plans to join the Beth Israel Deaconess Care Organization in 2014. The accountable care organization, formed with Harvard...
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Connecticut hospitals would win big under the CMS' latest update of its controversial rural-floor policy. The latest agency calculations project hospitals in the state will see a $75 million boost in fiscal 2014, compared with $16.7 million in the current fiscal year, because of a Medicare payment modifier based on rural and urban hospital categorizations in each state.
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Steward Health Care System is blaming Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Rhode Island for tanking its bid to buy Landmark Medical Center in Woonsocket, R.I.The Boston-based system filed a lawsuit alleging the insurer used its dominance in Rhode Island to prevent Steward from entering the state. After spending years pursuing a deal to acquire the 133-bed community hospital and investing millions of dollars in the financially troubled facility, Steward walked away from the transaction in September.
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PITTSBURGH—UPMC, a not-for-profit health system with its tax-exempt status under attack, is fighting back with a lawsuit against its hometown and mayor. The health system's lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court in the Western District of Pennsylvania, alleges the city of Pittsburgh and Mayor Luke Ravenstahl violated UPMC's right to due process and equal protection when they filed suit in March to challenge UPMC's tax breaks. The health system also argued that it was illegally singled out and that the tax challenge infringed on its right to pursue business across state lines...
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NEW YORK—Amid upheaval in Brooklyn's hospital industry, a study released last week captures the health needs of residents in some of the borough's poorer neighborhoods who suffer from high rates of chronic illness. Bedford-Stuyvesant, Bushwick, Brownsville and Crown Heights residents feel health officials have not responded to their opposition to the closure of hospitals in the borough. The community health needs assessment, sponsored by the Brooklyn Hospital Center in conjunction with various community stakeholders, comes as officials are considering closing Long Island College...
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Pittsburgh's mayor said UPMC should pay property and payroll taxes because the hospital operator fails to meet state criteria for tax exemption, citing legal counsel that found the UPMC system likely spends too little on free care for low-income patients and too much on executive compensation to merit tax breaks.Luke Ravenstahl, Pittsburgh's mayor, announced the city's legal department would challenge UPMC's tax exemptions in court.
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NEW YORK—Cigarettes would have to be kept out of sight in New York City stores under a first-in-the-nation plan unveiled by Mayor Michael Bloomberg last week, igniting complaints from retailers and smokers who said they've had enough with the city's crackdowns. Shops from corner stores to supermarkets would have to keep tobacco products in cabinets, drawers, under the counter, behind a curtain or in other concealed spots. Officials also want to stop shops from taking cigarette coupons and honoring discounts, and are proposing a minimum price for cigarettes, below what the going...
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Funding cuts from the state of New York are expected to sock publicly funded hospitals, particularly SUNY Downstate Medical Center, which has less than five months before it could face insolvency.The 360-bed facility in the New York City borough of Brooklyn is already working under a plan to reduce its workforce, cut costs, restructure its debt and maximize revenue. SUNY Downstate is also attempting to shutter 337-bed Long Island College Hospital, also in Brooklyn, which was pegged in a state audit as a “major cause” of its “fiscal stress.”
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PITTSBURGH—Insurer Highmark closed on a deal for its first hospital under a costly plan to diversify and compete with the region's well-financed and largest health system. Jefferson Regional Medical Center, in Jefferson Hills, Pa., will receive $100 million for capital projects under the deal, as well as cash for outstanding debt and pension costs, which Moody's Investors Service estimated to be $160 million. Jefferson Regional Medical Center's foundation will receive $75 million. Highmark in 2011 announced plans to expand into hospital operations with the proposed acquisition of...
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PITTSBURGH—The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center announced that LifeSolutions, its not-for-profit organization that specializes in employee assistance programs, has acquired Erie, Pa.-based Northwest Beacon EAP. Though financial details of the agreement are not being released, the deal calls for six Northwest Beacon EAP staff to be retained as part of the purchase. They will continue serving their 60 northwest Pennsylvania clients from their Erie office but as employees of LifeSolutions. “While the decision to sell Northwest Beacon was difficult, I wanted to find a...
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North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System is facing a widening legal battle over allegations that it failed to notify hundreds of patients—including a doctor working at the system—that an identity-theft ring had stolen their unprotected confidential information.
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NEW YORK—Bellevue Hospital Center in New York announced it has started to admit patients again after damage from superstorm Sandy in October forced the hospital to evacuate more than 700 patients and close. The hospital is one of two owned by New York City Health and Hospitals Corp. that suffered extensive damage from the storm, which caused coastal flooding and widespread power outages as the storm reached land on Oct. 29. Health and Hospital Corp.'s Coney Island Hospital, also closed by flooding, began to admit patients in mid-January. The system said last month that costs from...
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HARTFORD, Conn.—One of Connecticut's largest hospitals could be the first hospital to join Ascension Health Care Network, a private equity-backed effort to launch a for-profit Catholic health system. St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center, Hartford, signed an exclusive letter of intent to join Ascension Health Care Network, a joint venture between the private equity firm Oak Hill Capital Partners and Ascension Health Alliance, which includes the nation's largest Catholic health system. Leo Brideau, president and CEO of Ascension Health Care Network, said the size and complexity...
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The CMS denied New York state's request for emergency cash relief for healthcare providers that lost revenue or saw expenses soar as superstorm Sandy forced the evacuation of hospitals and nursing homes. In November, the state requested $427 million under a Medicaid waiver that would have awarded the greatest relief to hospitals closed by the storm. The relief request also included hospitals that saw services disrupted by lost power or temporary damage, those that took in evacuated patients and transportation providers.
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PORTLAND, Maine—Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems signed a definitive agreement to acquire Mercy Hospital, a 168-bed hospital in Portland, that is part of Catholic Health East. As part of the deal, EMHS will acquire Mercy and its service units, including VNA Home Health & Hospice in South Portland. EMHS, based in Brewer, owns seven hospitals and is the second largest health system in Maine based on bed count. The organizations announced plans to pursue a deal in December. Four months earlier, Mercy had entered into talks with Steward Health Care System, the Boston-based for-profit...
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NYU Langone Medical Center, the badly battered 806-bed facility that was shuttered by superstorm Sandy, resumed many of its operations Dec. 27, but its emergency room will remain closed and will continue routing patients to other facilities.The hospital, which was forced to evacuate about 300 patients down several flights of stairs when its backup generator failed, has reopened several departments and plans to resume nearly all services by mid-January.
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BERLIN, Vt.—Vermont plans to break ground this week on a 25-bed psychiatric hospital in Berlin that will serve as a replacement for a state psychiatric hospital that was closed after sustaining damage caused by Tropical Storm Irene in 2011. The state has fast-tracked plans to build the $38 million hospital and expects to complete construction by early spring of 2014, said Frank Reed, deputy commissioner of the Vermont Department of Mental Health. The state last week opened the Green Mountain Psychiatric Care Center, a temporary eight-bed mental health facility in Morrisville. The...
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NEW YORK—Bellevue Hospital Center, one of two New York City-owned hospitals that remain closed because of damage from superstorm Sandy, resumed some ambulatory services Nov. 19. The hospital's emergency room is expected to open in mid-December after power is restored, but the ER will not accept trauma patients until the hospital's critical-care, operating rooms and other inpatient services resume in February, said Alan Aviles, president and CEO of the New York City Health and Hospital Corp., which owns Bellevue and Coney Island Hospital. “I'm very pleased to be able to say...
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TOWSON, Md.—Catholic Health Initiatives would exit Maryland under a deal moving forward to sell St. Joseph Medical Center in Towson to the University of Maryland Medical System. The parties announced in March they had entered exclusive negotiations and last week said they had sought required approvals from the Federal Trade Commission, the Archdiocese of Baltimore and regulatory agencies. Mary Lynn Carver, spokeswoman for the University of Maryland Medical System, declined to disclose terms of the deal, which calls for the system to acquire the assets under a newly created...
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