Budgeting
Health costs will accelerate next year, but changes in how people buy care will help keep them from attaining the speed of several years ago, PricewaterhouseCoopers says in a new report.
Driven by an aging population and an expanding pool of younger patients, bone-graft substitutes are a $2.5 billion market, which should continue to rise as a result of minimally invasive procedures.
The breakthrough hepatitits C drug Sovaldi has brought the high price of specialty pharma to recent public attention. But less examined are proactive approaches that could be used to curb the growth trend without depriving patients of needed therapies.
Disasters, natural and man-made, threaten more than hospital property. With many healthcare information technology systems integrated and focused on patient care, the threat of an IT or communications shutdown can be both dangerous to patients and costly to the health system.
While majorities of healthcare providers see value-based payment models becoming the reimbursement status quo in coming years, fewer than one-in-three say the reward is worth the risk.
A new Medicare prospective payment system for federally qualified health centers offers improved reimbursement rates.
In 2011, total revenue from hip implants in the U.S. was approximately $2.8 billion, and it's projected to grow to $3.3 billion by 2016. The growing use of these implants makes the category an important focus for healthcare organizations that are trying to manage their costs.
Aggregated clinical data are essential to managing population health. But analyzing the financial health of various service lines is a complex undertaking.
As a result of the push towards accountable care, increased patient census no longer translates to higher revenue for hospitals. Unless costs are managed internally, higher patient volume may instead lead to narrower margins, if not outright red ink.
Whether Congress pushing back the ICD-10 deadline will stall projects or healthcare organizations continue trekking forward is bound to be a matter of some debate for the foreseeable future.