News

The AHA today expressed support for the Children’s Hospital GME Support Reauthorization Act of 2018 (S. 2597/H.R. 5385), which would reauthorize the Children’s Hospitals Graduate Medical Education program for an additional five years and fund the program annually at $330 million.

The National Institutes of Health will spend about $1.1 billion this year on research to prevent and treat opioid addiction.

The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology today released an online guide to help patients and caregivers access and use their health information electronically.

Nearly 11.8 million people actively or automatically enrolled in a health plan through HealthCare.gov or a state-based exchange during open enrollment for 2018.

The AHA has launched its 2018 National Health Care Governance Survey, which will benchmark board structures, practices and culture and highlight best practices and trends in the evolving environment.

Maine hospitals contributed $10.2 billion and 66,870 direct and indirect jobs to the state’s economy in 2016

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention today urged state and local health departments and health care facilities to work with its Antibiotic Resistance Lab Network to implement a coordinated strategy to prevent the spread of unusual germs that are resistant to all or most antibiotics or can spread their resistance to other germs, reporting more than 220 instances of such germs in the United States last year.

The AHA, Association of American Medical Colleges, America’s Essential Hospitals, Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems, Henry Ford Health System and Adventist Health System's Park Ridge Health yesterday urged a federal appeals court to find that they are entitled to a preliminary injunction in their lawsuit to prevent a nearly 30% Medicare payment reduction for many hospitals in the 340B drug savings program.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration is accepting applications through May 29 for grants to establish, expand and maintain Assertive Community Treatment programs.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will host an April 5 webinar to update health care providers and others as it rolls out new Medicare cards to beneficiaries that replace the Social Security-based beneficiary number with a new Medicare beneficiary identifier.

April 28 is National Prescription Drug Take Back Day, an opportunity for the public to safely dispose of unwanted or expired prescription pills at sites throughout the country.

CMS anticipates MA plans and Part D sponsors will see an average revenue increase of 3.4%, excluding an expected 3.1% increase in risk scores.

The MedPAC should not finalize its draft recommendation to reduce payments for off-campus stand-alone emergency departments located within six miles of an on-campus hospital ED.

A federal judge has asked the AHA to provide suggestions on behalf of hospitals and health systems for how the HHS can reduce the backlog of Medicare billing appeals awaiting adjudication at the Administrative Law Judge level.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today named the AHA’s American Society for Healthcare Engineering an ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year

Connecticut hospitals and health systems contributed $27.7 billion to the state and local economies in 2016, according to a new report by the Connecticut Hospital Association.

Walmart is in preliminary talks to buy health insurer Humana, according to people familiar with the matter.

Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar yesterday named former CVS Health executive Daniel Best as his senior advisor on drug pricing reform, and Assistant Secretary for Health Brett Giroir, M.D., as his senior advisor on mental health and opioid policy.

Drug overdose deaths rose nearly 22% in 2016 to 63,632, two-thirds of which involved an opioid.

Nearly 16.4 million people enrolled in Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program between Oct. 1, 2013 and Jan. 31, 2018, increasing total enrollment in the programs by 29% since the start of the first open enrollment period for the Health Insurance Marketplace.