News

Hospitals and health systems added 15,700 jobs in December, while U.S. jobs overall increased by 223,000, according to data released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Total health care jobs grew by over 54,700 to a seasonally adjusted 16.7 million, including 9,100 new jobs in nursing and residential care facilities.

Joseph Perras, M.D., president and CEO of Mt. Ascutney Hospital and Health Center, Dartmouth Health (Vermont), will serve as 2023 chair of the AHA Rural Health Services Committee. Sean Fadale, president and CEO of Nathan Littauer Hospital and Nursing Home (New York), is chair-elect. Philip Pandolph, president and CEO, Meadville Medical Center (Pennsylvania), has transitioned to past-chair. Christina Freese Decker, president and CEO of Corewell Health (Michigan), will serve as liaison to the AHA Board of Trustees.

Learn about the alarming statistics on substance use disorders in America. Find out why so many people are not receiving the help they need.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Food and Drug Administration have identified seven linked cases of sepsis after transfusion from bacterially contaminated platelet blood products since 2018, according to a recent FDA safety communication.

The Department of Health and Human Services will launch this month a COVID-19 Home Test to Treat telehealth pilot program in Berks County, Pa. Program organizers will work this year with public health departments to expand the program to 100,000 people in vulnerable communities.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services yesterday released guidance on changes this year to the Medicaid continuous enrollment requirement under recently enacted legislation funding the federal government through fiscal year 2023.

The convening of the 118th Congress this week is a reminder of Washington’s highly-charged political environment.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention is working with NORC at the University of Chicago, AHA and others to identify and evaluate health systems implementing anti-racism practices with the potential to reduce health disparities and improve outcomes.

Join fellow executive leaders from the nation’s top hospitals and health systems at the 2023 AHA Annual Membership Meeting, April 23-25 in Washington, D.C.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services yesterday released guidance to clarify how states can use an existing Medicaid managed care option to reduce health disparities and address unmet health-related social needs

Workforce shortages and financial challenges are jeopardizing access to hospital care and services, writes AHA President and CEO Rick Pollack in an advertorial today in the New York Times. 

The Clop ransomware group has been sending health care facilities ransomware-infected medical files disguised to appear to come from legitimate doctors, then requesting a medical appointment in hopes they’ll open and review the documents, the Department of Health and Human Services alerted the health sector today.

Matthew Stanley, D.O., vice president, behavioral health clinical service line, Avera Health (South Dakota) is the 2023 chair of AHA’s Committee on Behavioral Health.

In a study reported yesterday in JAMA Internal Medicine, children and adolescents previously diagnosed with multisystem inflammatory syndrome (MIS-C) reported no serious complications after COVID-19 vaccination.

U.S. hospitals and health systems continued to experience negative operating margins through November 2022, Kaufman Hall reported.

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response Friday deployed a 14-member National Disaster Medical System team to the University of New Mexico Children’s Hospital to help support staff caring for a surge in pediatric respiratory illnesses, such as flu and Respiratory Syncytial Virus.

A recent Wall Street Journal article on hospital divestitures and closures “fails to acknowledge the critical roles that low government reimbursement, population shifts and old infrastructure play” when nonprofit health care systems make access decisions, AHA President and CEO Rick Pollack writes in a letter to the editor published yesterday.

AHA today thanked the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission for recommending a 2024 draft payment update of market basket plus 1% for hospital inpatient and outpatient prospective payment systems, but continued to recommend a market basket plus 2.8% update for inpatient and outpatient PPS hospitals and 2.7% update for long-term care hospitals, saying hospitals and health systems face unprecedented financial pressures due to inflation and almost two decades of negative Medicare margins.

The Department of Health and Human Services Office of Civil Rights yesterday announced a proposed rule with changes to the process for handling conscience complaints, while adding safeguards to protect against conscience and religious discrimination.

President Biden late Thursday signed into law the $1.7 trillion omnibus bill that will keep the government funded through September 2023.