Tag Archives: HealthCare Finance

Healthcare: Mergers & Profit Strategies Force Many Rural And Smaller Hospitals To Close (Video)

In rural towns across the U.S. hospitals are in crisis. Since 2010, 121 rural hospitals have closed. And, the National Rural Health Association says more than one-third of all rural hospitals in the U.S. are at serious risk of shutting down.

But not all hospitals are losing money. A series of mergers and acquisitions that began in the 1990’s has created massive hospital groups. Many of these hospital consortiums are turning huge profits every year by offering high priced services to well insured patients.

Healthcare Surveys: Nursing Shortage Threatens System As Baby Boomers & Nurses Retire

From a Healthcare Finance news article:

AMN Survey of Registered NursesA third of the nurses who took the survey are baby boomers and 20% of survey takers said they planned to retire in the next five years. More than a quarter, 27%, said they were unlikely to be working at their current job in a year.

The shortage threatens to collide with the impending retirement of the baby boomers, all of whom will be 65 years old by 2030, said the survey titled “A Challenging Decade Ahead.” People over 65 are hospitalized three times as often as middle-aged individuals, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Amid a nursing shortage, hospitals are struggling to hire and keep nurses, with burnout and workplace violence cited as contributing factors, according to a new survey.

Flexibility and work-life balance had the most influence for 39% of nurses in whether they decided to stick with a job, though 31% say compensation and benefits were the biggest driving factor, according to AMN Healthcare’s 2019 Survey of Registered Nurses.

To read more: https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/node/139458

Health Care: Greater Use Of “Biosimilars” Could Save System $7 Billion

From a Health Care Finance News online article:

HealthCare Finance NewsBut greater use of biosimilars could create significantly more savings. If biosimilars obtained a 75 percent market share, less than the share of these medicines in many European Union nations, the resulting annual savings for the U.S. healthcare system could be nearly $7 billion, based on Winegarden’s analysis.

Not all drugs are created the same. Take generics and biologics: The former is a chemical-based medicine whose manufacture is easily replicated, while the latter is created using biological processes.

But there’s another key difference between those two classes of drugs, and it pertains to the financial state of the healthcare industry and to U.S. taxpayer dollars. Stated plainly, biosimilars have the opportunity to bring significant savings to state Medicaid programs and consumers with commercial insurance. That gives them a leg up over their chemical-based counterparts.

To read more: https://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/expanding-biosimilars-market-holds-potential-significant-savings-state-medicaid-programs?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTTJGbU1qTXpOVFpqTm1WbCIsInQiOiJrU3puNU4xNVB2eTBBVkpwQ3FGaWhYdDJwZEV0M1dlcFRBakNpOFZ5YVYyanpSSk9HeVZCQTBHbjY4ZktFXC82cm9JeWE3S2dUWm5HMXByYTVoOVB6SG9FaWRIWnRta2ZzZUNvN1g2WHVneVNtVEFpT1ZlZjEwWk1KbmFaXC9qN3N2In0%3D