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Source: Julie Rovner, NPR, May 17, 2012

Related:
Debt Collector Is Faulted for Tough Tactics in Hospitals
Source: Jessica Silver-Greenberg, New York Times, April 24, 2012

...One of the nation's largest medical debt-collection companies is under fire in Minnesota for having placed its employees in emergency rooms and other departments at two hospitals and demanding that patients pay before receiving treatment, according to documents released Tuesday by the Minnesota attorney general. The documents say the company also used patient health records to wrangle for more money on overdue bills.

The company, Accretive Health, has contracts with dozens of hospitals around the country. Since January, it has faced a civil lawsuit filed by Attorney General Lori Swanson of Minnesota alleging that it violated state and federal debt-collection laws and patient privacy protections. ...

...As a growing number of hospitals struggle under a glut of unpaid bills, they are turning to companies like Accretive. To win promised savings, all hospitals have to do is turn over the management of their front-line staffing -- ranging from patient registration to scheduling and billing -- and their back-office collection activities. Accretive says it has such arrangements with some of the country's largest hospital systems to help reduce their costs. ...

Source: Sid Riley, Jackson County Times, May 11, 2012

In his promised ongoing effort to reduce the costs of delivering state services, Governor Scott continues to convert selected state jobs and services back to the private sector. This Monday Hospital Administrator Diane James, of the Florida State Hospital in Chattahoochee, met with impacted employees to discuss the upcoming transition. Some 226 state jobs in Maintenance and Housekeeping will be privatized, effective June 30....Aramark representatives will be on the hospital campus this week to begin interviewing all impacted employees. By May 25, the retention decisions will be made, and those selected workers who wish to become Aramark employees will be hired.

Source: Laura Incalcaterra, LoHud.com, May 14, 2012

Rockland County government leaders are relying on a report to be released today to guide their decisions regarding the future of the county-run Summit Park Hospital and Nursing Care Center. The financially troubled Summit Park has contributed to the overall fiscal crisis that the county is facing, including a budget deficit of more than $80 million....Summit Park, on the grounds of the Yeager Health Complex in Ramapo, includes a 341-bed nursing home, a 57-bed acute-care hospital and a 43-bed short-stay mental-health unit....The county hired consultants in September to study Summit Park to help determine the facility's future. Options included closing it, selling it to a private company or creating a public-benefit corporation....

Source: Nicole Wallace, Chronicle of Philanthropy, April 29, 2012

Across the country tens of thousands of nursing assistants, child-care employees, home-health aides, group-home employees, people who work at after-school programs, and others provide vital services at health-care and human-services charities. The work is physically and emotionally taxing, yet because wages are so low, these employees face many of the same financial challenges as the people they serve.

Nonprofit employers say they want to pay frontline workers more but can't because of low government-reimbursement rates and the challenge of raising money from donors to improve wages....Volunteers of America Greater New Orleans employs more than 160 personal-care attendants who provide services that allow people with intellectual disabilities to live on their own. The average wage for those positions is $8.70 an hour.

In 2006, Louisiana increased its Medicaid reimbursement rate to $16 an hour, which allowed the charity to increase wages to their current rate, says Jim LeBlanc, head of Volunteers of America Greater New Orleans. But the state has since lowered the rate to $14.68.

In addition to covering the attendants' wages, the charity uses the reimbursement to pay for workers' compensation and liability insurance, supervisors to oversee the attendants, and other program costs.

Workers do not currently receive health insurance, but Mr. LeBlanc is already anticipating that the charity may have to provide it in 2014 under the new federal health-care law....

Source: Julia Terruso, Star-Ledger, May 06, 2012

Brandon Thomas has worked as a custodian at Runnells Specialized Hospital for the past three years. But in less than a month, he and the entire housekeeping, laundry and dietary staffs are to be laid off and their departments privatized, according to county plans..... A private company already has been contracted to provide occupational, speech and physical therapy to patients..... The hospital had an $11.3 million deficit last year, attributed largely to state cuts in Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements.... ..For Runnells, the privatization of parts of the hospital could foreshadow bigger changes. Officials said everything is on the table, including complete privatization.

Source: Paul Jesilow, International Criminal Justice Review, Vol. 22 no. 1, March 2012
(subscription required)

From the abstract:
Frauds committed by recipients of public insurance and providers of health care are stealing millions of kronor from Swedish taxpayers each year. Privatization in Sweden's health care will likely increase the losses from fraud. Vårdval, Sweden's latest method to transfer the delivery of health services from public entities to private ones, focuses on primary care and is an attempt to secure "seamless" treatment for patients at a nearby location and hopefully reduce health care costs. But the new policy also creates numerous opportunities for unscrupulous providers and patients to steal from Sweden's taxpayer-supported programs. The intent of the current research was to explore the impacts of privatization on the regulation of Swedish health care. One of those impacts, it is argued, will be a need for Swedish officials to attend to a growing crime problem. Lessons from the United States suggest that government attention to the problem at this early stage is needed to prevent the thefts from growing and becoming a major drain on Sweden's budget, as they are in the United States.

Source: Theresa Boyle, Toronto Star, March 27 2012

The Niagara Health System, which battled a deadly C. difficile outbreak last year, is cutting ties with the U.S. firm that manages its cleaning services amid allegations of lax housekeeping...Meantime, an investigation into hospital cleanliness by CBC's Marketplace, revealed that housekeeping at three of seven hospitals in the Niagara Health System is wanting. An episode that aired last week showed how a harmless gel was placed on high-touch surfaces like light switches and elevator buttons. Some 24 later, the gel was still there, indicating the surfaces had not been cleaned.

Aramark had managed cleaning services at NHS since 2002, but organization spokesperson Caroline Bourque Wiley said a decision has been taken to move the management position in-house. In addition, she said the organization will be adding the equivalent of 18 new full-time cleaning positions.

Source: Mark Miller, Reuters, March 22, 2012

The Republican Party doubled down on privatizing Medicare with the 2012 budget plan released yesterday by Republican Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin). It's their latest pitch for a reform that would let seniors shop for coverage in an insurance exchange marketplace in lieu of traditional Medicare.

Source: Steve Zabroski, nwitimes.com, Wednesday, March 14, 2012

City officials launched plans Wednesday to fast-track privatization of the city's ambulance services. Hopefuls received just a week to submit offers to take over duties for emergency medical care. The official request for proposals the Board of Public Works approved holds a March 21 deadline. Privatization would transfer services from the East Chicago's Fire Department to another provider. Mayor Anthony Copeland first suggested in January that privatizing emergency medical transportation could cut $1.4 million from a potential budget shortfall of $3.7 million this year...The city would pay nothing. The provider would be responsible for collecting all fees, which "shall not exceed the usual and customary rates for ambulance services in Lake County," the request state....The companies that already have expressed interest in taking over the EMS -- Prompt Ambulance Service and Superior Air-Ground Ambulance Service of Indiana, both with offices in Highland -- would not be bound by those collection restrictions.

Source: Fred Hiers, Ocala.com Saturday, March 10, 2012

The public trustees who are considering leasing or selling Munroe Regional Medical Center are coming up against a hard truth: It is almost impossible to predict how either move would affect the quality and array of services the hospital is able to provide. .... Behind the debate is a stark reality: Munroe needs $150 million in capital improvements to remain competitive.