From Crains:Two events defined 2013 for New York City hospitals: the battle to keep two failing Brooklyn hospitals open, and Mount Sinai Medical Center's takeover of the former Continuum Health Partners. Closures and consolidations will again set the tone for hospitals in 2014. New York City hospitals need fewer beds—and fewer employees, too.
This isn't news to New Yorkers who have witnessed the death of St. Vincent's Hospital and other recent bankruptcies. Hospitals have been struggling with reimbursement cuts for years. But in 2014, a convergence of trends will accelerate consolidations and closings.
One trend is the way insurers are paring their network of hospitals and doctors under Obamacare. Low-priced health plans sold on the new insurance exchange are less costly because they offer a limited choice of providers, often only a quarter of the number in more traditional insurance policies. Some hospitals will find their patients steered elsewhere.
Insurers and companies that pay employee health care costs have -realized they "don't need a phone book of providers," said one hospital executive. "That is a revolution. Hospital utilization is dropping because the plan benefits are changing."
Another factor that will drive down hospitalization in 2014 is an ambitious new plan by New York state to cut the rate of avoidable hospitalizations by 25% over five years. That means shifting care from institutional settings to outpatient clinics and other alternatives.
The fall in hospital employment may begin in early 2014. Mayor Bill de Blasio may try to keep Brooklyn's money-losing Long Island College Hospital open, but the Cobble Hill facility filed a notice of mass layoffs with the state Department of Labor, specifying that 1,442 employees could lose their jobs between Jan. 21 and Feb. 3.
Likewise, bankrupt Interfaith Medical Center had been set to fire 1,545 workers late last month until the state promised funding to keep the hospital open through March 7.
Mount Sinai Health System cut 70 positions—a fraction of its 35,000 employees—shortly after its merger with Continuum, but the possibility remains that more consolidation could lie ahead.
10 comments:
Obamacare 2016.
No, this is the result of America's bizarre "market based" healthcare system finally entering it's terminal stage.
"ObamaCare" is just the last phase and a desperate attempt by the insurance industry to keep relevant in a game that bankrupts over 400,000. Americans each year.
The Catholic church is not good at running health care.
They selling off their properties for the $$$$$$$.
Actually, the Catholic church was excellent at running health care.They also treated people that others wouldn't. The problem is that hospital administration is often corrupt. Take a look at Peninsula.
It least with Obamacare, they carted the dead away. When that's gone, the dead will be lying in the houses stinking the places up.
The financial realities are staring you in the face. The government has come to realize that we have too much health care. People are artificially living way past their shelf life thanks to advances in medicine.
Look at the obituaries in the local newspapers. People are regularly living into their eighties and nineties. They are on so much medicine that the cost of their survival is unsustainable.
Medicare and Social Security were not meant to service such an elderly population as we have now. And Obamacare is nothing more than a Medical Ponzi scheme.
Soon the earth will not be able to carry it's population and food will become either scarce or unaffordable causing conflicts between the rich and poor.
What we need is a pandemic that will correct the population by culling about 25% of the inhabitants.
And may you be in the first
25%......
Anonymous said...
"What we need is a pandemic that will correct the population by culling about 25% of the inhabitants"
That statement by you shows you have no scruples !
City and state run hospitals get whatever it takes to keep them open.
Non-profits are (or were) paying the health care costs for illegals and the poor and not getting reimbursed. Do that for tens of thousands over 30 or 40 years, and any hospital will go bankrupt. It never was sustainable.
I agree with Mr. Pandemic. I knew of someone in their 90s for whom Medicare paid over a MILLION dollars for seven weeks of cancer treatment.
He was a lovely person but his life was not necessarily extended in any positive way as the radiation seemed to have zapped his brain - even though it wasn't aimed there!
The elderly undergo too many tests and procedures and are on too many meds. A little accountability is needed. They shouldn't be allowed to live on Entenmann's and then get free diabetes meds! These are the people that can actually afford to shop at Whole Foods!
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