Stephanie Bouchard
Kaiser Permanente is planning a structural departure: It wants to build a small hospital rather than its usual large medical center. Since it's stepping out of its comfort zone, the company launched a design competition, "Small Hospital, Big Idea," in February, seeking an open hospital design from students, architects, engineers, designers and multidisciplinary teams for a small hospital to be built in southern California.
An opinion piece published in February's edition of the New England Journal of Medicine calls for the creation of a national health policy curriculum for medical schools.
More than 1,000 registered nurses at Kaiser Permanente's Los Angeles Medical Center are going on strike Wednesday - the first nursing strike at the Sunset Boulevard facility in 20 years.
The non-profit Mayo Clinic has reported that it built on its solid 2009 financial performance to end 2010 in a position of financial strength by holding expenses at a 2.5 percent increase while growing revenue by 4.7 percent.
Ventas, a Chicago-based real estate investment trust with more than 700 assets in 44 states, is acquiring Nationwide Health Properties, which has more than 650 properties in its portfolio.
The Alabama State Supreme Court has upheld a 2009 ruling that Richard Scrushy, founder and former CEO of HealthSouth, must pay $2.8 billion to shareholders over accusations of fraud.
The American Association of Homecare says the competitive bidding process initiated for Medicare patients at the start of 2011 is not working.
Hospitals could see substantial savings by instituting environmentally-friendly practices in operating rooms, says a study published in the February issue of Archives of Surgery.
As the price of a barrel of oil skyrockets, spurring fears of a worldwide recession, officials at Novation, a healthcare contracting supply company, and its members will be able to track supply costs better than before because the Texas-based company just began publishing its Budget Projections Impact Reports monthly instead of bi-yearly.
Horizon Healthcare Innovations, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, has teamed up with 63 physicians in New Jersey to launch a statewide PCMH. To help the process along, Horizon is funding population care coordinators to be embedded in physicians' offices.