Risk Management

Hospital does not charge for any additional care within 30 days of a hip or knee replacement, covering readmissions, infections, rehab and postoperative care — everything except deficiencies in the joint devices.

Federal penalties for high rates of patient readmissions are compelling hospitals to dig into the causes of the re-hospitalizations, which frequently have more to do with socioeconomic factors than the healthcare provided.

“Not all readmissions can or should be prevented; indeed, some are planned as part of sound clinical care,” AHA says.

Some health systems are trying to help patients avoid high-cost bills altogether, by working with insurers to craft value-based plans that offer low out-of-pocket costs.

Department of Justice says chain allowed patients to undergo radiation cancer treatment that was not supervised by radiation oncologists.

A number of big deals, involving both for-profit and nonprofit health systems, have recently fallen apart amid pushback from regulators and skepticism from researchers, who note a lack of evidence about long-term quality and cost impacts.

Premera hack puts renewed focus on securing sensitive healthcare info.

Collect financial information upfront, fight insurance denials, and send a combined bill from hospital and physician among advice for hospital finance staff.

While the sector is struggling, one expert offers these financial tips for enhancing investment assets to shore up balance sheets at hospitals and health systems.

You can expect more credit downgrades than upgrades in 2015 among the country's nonprofit hospitals, Standard & Poor's announced this week, as expensive upgrades and pressures to convert to value-based payment systems continue to gnaw away at bottom lines.