Monday, May 8 2017
State Highlights: Bernie Sanders Urges Calif. To 'Lead Country' With Single-Payer; Mounting Costs Threaten Tenn. Hospitals
Media outlets report on news from California, Tennessee, Maryland, Massachusetts, Georgia, Colorado, Washington, Ohio and Florida.
Sacramento Bee: Bernie Sanders Wants Single-Payer Health Care In California
Senate Bill 562, which would create a universal, publicly funded health care system in California, is generating tremendous enthusiasm among liberals and its supporters, including unionized nurses who backed Sanders' presidential campaign with millions of dollars. But even some of the state's leading Democrats, including Gov. Jerry Brown, have raised questions about whether this is the right time for single-payer or how the plan would be paid for. (Cadelago, 5/6)
Nashville Tennessean: Patient Care Doesn't Keep Tennessee's Hospitals In The Black
Mounting costs and shrinking payments are threatening to shutter hospitals around the state, as the expense of providing Tennesseans with vital health care increasingly outweighs the revenue coming in. Hospitals use gross charges — or the money they charge for services before applying discounts for insurance contracts and Medicare payments, among others — as an indicator of what they need to function. They aren't getting it. (Fletcher, 5/7)
The Baltimore Sun: Therapists Accused Of Sexual Misconduct Allowed To See Patients, State Audit Finds
The state board that licenses professional counselors and therapists took up to a year to tell the Maryland attorney general's office about cases of sexual misconduct and practicing without a license, a state audit released last week found. The delayed notifications allowed the violators to continue seeing patients. The Board of Professional Counselors and Therapists investigates complaints but must submit its findings to the attorney general before it can mete out punishment, including revoking or temporarily suspending a professional license, putting a practitioner on probation. (McDaniels, 5/6)
Boston Globe: Unorthodox Northampton Program Helps Veterans With Drug Problems
There are no surveillance cameras at Soldier On, which is a nonprofit organization that is separate from the VA facility. There also are no scheduled drug tests, and residents can come and go until a midnight curfew. Even some of the scheduled medications for veterans are distributed by fellow addicts and alcoholics. (MacQarrie, 5/8)
Atlanta Journal Constitution: Georgia Eligible For $50 Million To Hire More School Nurses
Georgia schools have been short-changing themselves as much as $50 million annually in federal funding for school nurses. The state Department of Education realized this recently and is working with another state agency to tap the money, which would come from Medicaid. (Tygami, 5/5)
Denver Post: Clinics, Therapists Who Serve Needy Coloradans Say The State Isn't Paying Them, Wonder If Officials Are Listening
It's been two long months since the state's Medicaid department went live with a new computer system to pay doctors, caregivers for the disabled and others who treat needy people with government insurance. Medical clinics, children's mental health centers and therapists say the new payment system is broken. And despite complaining to lawmakers, the governor's office and state Medicaid officials, and spending hours on hold with the computer system's help line, they still are suffering without income they rely on to keep their businesses open. (Brown, 5/7)
New England Center for Investigative Reporting: Advocates Say Preventing Prison Suicides Has Not Been A Priority For The State
At least 42 men and women have died by suicide in Massachusetts county jails since 2012, more than twice the number of suicides in the state prison system over the period, even though both systems house roughly the same number of inmates. And while state prison suicides have declined in recent years, the rate of suicides in the state's 13 county jails has doubled, according to an investigation by The Eye, the online news site of the New England Center for Investigative Reporting. (McKim and Sajadi, 5/6)
Seattle Times: Seattle's Harborview Could Lose $627M A Year Under New Health-Care Bill, Executive Director Says
Harborview Medical Center's executive director said Friday the hospital could lose more than $627 million a year starting in 2026 when the full impact of the health-care bill passed Thursday by the House of Representatives would be felt. Hospital officials said the potential loss would come through a combined decrease in federal revenue and increase in costs of charity and uncompensated care. (Morton and Young, 5/5)
Los Angeles Times: President Of Dignity Health Glendale Memorial Hospital To Retire In June
Jack Ivie, president of Dignity Health Glendale Memorial Hospital, will retire at the end of next month after more than four decades at the hospital, according to a statement released on Friday. Ivie served as the assistant executive director and vice president of hospital operations from 1980 to 1992 before taking the role as the hospital's president in 2012. All four of his children were born at Glendale Memorial, according to the statement. (Landa, 5/5)
Columbus Dispatch: Pickerington Couple May Go To Mexico To Treat Son's Cancer
Many families whose kids are diagnosed with DIPG at least want to try a clinical trial after finishing radiation, hoping that pioneering drug treatment will ease symptoms and grant their children additional months or years. But out-of-pocket costs can be high, even with insurance coverage. And for those who look to trials outside the country — the Bandavanis family might join one in Monterrey, Mexico — parents generally are on their own for the entire tab. (Price, 5/7)
Tampa Bay Times: Lawmakers Fail To Pass Medical Pot Bill, 'Thwarting' The Voters Who Approved It
As behind-the-scenes negotiations broke down in the final hours of their annual session Friday, the Florida Legislature failed to pass legislation putting medical marijuana, passed overwhelmingly by voters, into effect. A dispute over technical parts of the bill became too much for negotiators to overcome. At issue were restrictions on growers and dispensaries, a topic important to those who wanted a piece of what experts say could become a $1 billion a year market. (Auslen, 5/5)
Columbus Dispatch: Medical-Marijuana Growers Face Sprint To Market After State Grants Permits
It's spring planting time in Ohio, but companies hoping to dive into the business of growing medical marijuana must wait months to put crops into the ground. It appears that it will be a mad rush to get medical marijuana to customers by September 2018, as is anticipated in House Bill 523, a state law that took effect on Sept. 8, 2016. (Johnson, 5/5)