Looks like you are getting it, America, so here is what you can expect in the future.
"Executives snub hearing on rising health care costs" by Kay Lazar, Globe Staff | January 8, 2010
With rising health care costs burdening the country, Governor Deval Patrick’s attempt to find out what can be done about them is being met with resounding silence from many of the state’s health care executives.
That's such garbage.
EVERYONE KNOWS what the PARTNERS' PROBLEM is!!
Globe WON an AWARD for it!
Leaders of some of the state’s largest hospitals failed to show up at a public hearing yesterday to answer regulators’ questions about what is driving up costs. A month earlier, officials of the state’s major insurance companies testified at an earlier set of hearings, but refused to answer many key questions. The hearings on hospital costs, which conclude Tuesday, are part of a three-month probe by the Patrick administration that started as an investigation into the reasons for the disproportionately high health insurance rates paid by small businesses, but has since mushroomed into a larger, systemwide inquiry. Leaders from just two of the 17 hospitals or hospital networks invited to testify yesterday appeared at the hearing: Cambridge Health Alliance and Emerson Hospital in Concord....
All this TAXPAYER TIME and MONEY on an "investigation" when THEY ALREADY KNOW the PROBLEM!!
Among yesterday’s no-shows were executives of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston Medical Center, Caritas Christi Health Care, and Children’s Hospital Boston....
Dozens of executives from the state’s health insurers did testify when called last month by regulators, but several refused to answer some questions, such as why they pay some hospitals and doctors up to three times as much as others for the same services.
Can the PROBLEM be ANY MORE OBVIOUS!
The EMPEROR has GOWN, America!
Some executives said hospital payments are based on fierce competition among hospitals and doctors in certain areas of the state and that confidentiality agreements with hospitals or physician groups prevented them from disclosing payment data.
Don't you LOVE the never-ending DISASSEMBLING and GIBBERISH?
Yesterday, the insurers’ trade association criticized the hospitals for snubbing the Patrick administration.
Lora Pellegrini, acting president and chief executive of the Massachusetts Association of Health Plans:
“Generally, in this business, when government officials ask you to join them in a meeting, you attend. I find it unacceptable that so many hospitals would ignore or not make the time to sit with state officials and talk to them about what they see as driving up health care costs.’’
I guess it ALL DEPENDS on WHO YOU ARE!
I think I'll BLOW OFF COURTMass. Needs Less Lawsthe next time I get it.
Yup, your tax dough at work, Bay-Staters!
And at 3x the cost for health care.
Executives of the state’s largest and most influential hospital network, Partners HealthCare, which includes Brigham and Women’s and Massachusetts General hospitals, will testify as scheduled on Monday morning, said spokesman Rich Copp. The Globe Spotlight Team reported last year that Partners HealthCare hospitals are often paid more for services than competitors, a phenomenon many say has helped drive up medical spending in Massachusetts....
Why does the Globe short-sell themselves here of all places?
Related: Memory Hole: Why the Nation Doesn't Need Massachusetts Health Care
Yes, they KNOW ALL ABOUT IT and WON an AWARD, and yet EVERYONE ACTS as if they KNOW NOTHING about it!
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They NEVER MENTION IT the NEXT TIME! WHY?
Because THAT is the PROBLEM and NO ONE wants to SEE IT?
SINGLE-PAYER might become VERY, VERY POPULAR (80% of the public wants that now; they see how it works other places, and they know we can do it. We are AmeriKans!)
Then again, the sub-state.....
"High costs aren’t due to local issues, Partners says" by Liz Kowalczyk, Globe Staff | January 12, 2010
Partners HealthCare - unlike many of its competitors, which were no-shows at hearings last week - appeared before state regulators yesterday to explain the reasons for skyrocketing health care costs, saying it is not to blame.
David McGuire, Partners vice president for system contracting, told Division of Insurance officials that rising insurance costs are a national phenomenon, not solely a state problem caused by higher reimbursement rates paid by insurers to Partners hospitals.
What?
That is the most non sequitur of answers I have ever heard!
Instead, he cited inadequate rates paid by Medicare and Medicaid, the government insurance programs, which increase costs for everyone else....
Yeah, point the finger, you price-gouging pukes!
Partners, the state’s largest hospital and physician network, has been under scrutiny from regulators because it often receives much higher fees than other hospitals for providing the same services to patients....
What insurance do you have? Pfft!
The hearings are part of a probe by the Patrick administration that started as an inquiry into the reasons for the disproportionately high health insurance rates paid by small businesses, but has since expanded into a larger systemwide inquiry....
Kevin Beagan, deputy commissioner of insurance, did most of the questioning and at one point asked McGuire why Partners’ hospitals’ costs are generally higher than those of competitors.
“We have more capacity for very high-end services that have to be in place at all times, such as trauma and burn services,’’ he said. “The cost of those gets spread across all other services.’’
I'm sorry, I don't speak gobbledeygook.
Beagan left it at that. But he grilled executives from all the hospitals about the reasons for their rising costs, and what they are doing to try to control those costs. “We’re trying to get to the bottom of this,’’ he said....
No, no, he's not.
Globe already did.
Related: The Massachusetts Model: Padding Insurer Profits
Amazing that the Globe would turn off its award-winning spotlight, isn't it?
And enlightening as to WHO the PAPER really SERVES, readers!
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Meanwhile, let's throw some hospital cafeteria food around:
"Simmering spat over payments between Patrick, BMC boils over" by Liz Kowalczyk, Globe Staff | January 8, 2010
A yearlong dispute over the adequacy of state payments to Boston Medical Center has erupted into an open and pointed disagreement between the hospital’s outgoing president and Governor Deval Patrick.
Hope you ENJOY the SQUABBLING, America!
And WHO BENEFITS when we are DIVIDED for NO REASON -- especially when WE AGREE?
In a Christmastime letter to the hospital’s board chairman, Patrick wrote that, during a speech to wealthy hospital donors, Boston Medical Center president Elaine Ullian made comments that were “wrong’’ and “unhelpful’’ when she asserted that the state is neglecting its financial responsibility to the hospital. “What troubles me most,’’ Patrick went on to say, “is Elaine’s claim that I am personally insensitive to the people that BMC serves. “She forgets that I am of the people you serve,’’ he said....
No he's not!
See: The Boston Globe Censors Patrick's Past
That's not us. I'm not a corporate and government hack that benefited from the mortgage meltdown by preying on my fellow citizens.
Also see: Boston Medical Bonus
Yeah, she ain't no angel of mercy, either.
The relationship between the state’s largest provider of medical care to the poor and state officials has been strained for months. It broke down in July, when Boston Medical Center filed a lawsuit in Suffolk Superior Court against Dr. JudyAnn Bigby, health and human services secretary, accusing state officials of illegally cutting payments made to the hospital for treating thousands of poor patients, a decision executives said could financially unravel the urban hospital’s key services....
Yeah, THAT is OUR GREAT NATIONAL HEALTH PLAN for you!!!
And LAWSUITS ALWAYS DRAW PEOPLE TOGETHER, no?
The lawsuit argues that the state has financed its health insurance law, a model for national healthcare overhaul, on the backs of poor residents by cutting money to the hospital that cares for many of them to pay for expanded coverage.
Yeah, I was wondering how they did it, and why I don't want to use it.
While it has yet to file audited financial results for the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, Boston Medical Center estimates it lost $38 million, its first loss in five years. The hospital also projects that it will suffer a $134 million loss in its current fiscal year, which began Oct. 1....
And the lady the guv is fussing with made millions in bonuses and salary, huh?
What is wrong with that picture, 'eh, readers?
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