Covid Delays Cause Epidemic Of Patients In US Hospitals

Fox News: COVID-19 Scared Patients Out Of Hospitals, Bringing On Health Neglect And Extreme Backlogs
Doctors across the country are now seeing more patients who chose to avoid hospitals during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. They say this is causing a backlog of patients, many of whom are showing more serious health issues due to the lack of care during that period. Among them is Nalinthip Fetters, who recently found out she had a hole in her heart. She was supposed to get regular checkups but she, like many others, had steered clear of the hospital. "The pandemic happened and I just stopped. I didn’t want to deal with it because it was, like, COVID was going around," Fetters said. "I was so scared." (Addison, 4/19)

In other news —

San Francisco Chronicle: Sutter Hospital Chain Locking Out Nurses Who Staged One-Day Strike
Sutter Health has locked out thousands of nurses across Northern California who staged a one-day strike at 18 facilities this week, and said it will bar them from returning to work until Saturday morning. The action came a day after 8,000 Sutter health care workers walked off the job Monday amid stalled contract negotiations, prompting Sutter to postpone some patient procedures and hire temporary replacement workers. The hospital chain said Tuesday that it had guaranteed five days of work for the replacement workers “amid the uncertainty of a widespread work stoppage.” (Asimov, 4/19)

Modern Healthcare: Healthcare Industry Hit With Growing Number Of Retirement Plan Suits
Health insurance and hospital employees are filing more lawsuits against their employers over alleged failures to effectively manage their retirement accounts. Workers have filed 25 complaints against their employers this year, with at least 11 targeting the healthcare industry, including companies like Centene Corp., DaVita Inc. and Boston Children's Hospital, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The total has already exceeded the nine retirement benefits cases workers filed against healthcare companies in 2021, and is poised to beat 2020's record of 33 cases filed against healthcare industry employers, said Chantel Sheaks, the chamber's vice president of retirement policy. "It's not if, it's when," she said. (Tepper, 4/19)

Modern Healthcare: Primary Care Investment Could Improve Outcomes, Lower Costs 
Investing in primary care as a preventative measure is associated with improved medical care quality, fewer hospital visits and lower spending overall, a study has found. If all California providers spent as much on primary care as the highest investing health systems, they could avoid 25,000 acute hospital stays and 89,000 emergency department visits while saving $2.4 billion in healthcare spending a year, according to a study funded by the California Health Care Foundation, Covered California and the Milbank Memorial Fund. (Devereaux, 4/19)

Modern Healthcare: 5 Ways COVID-19 Shows Up In CMS' Proposed Hospital Pay Rule
After more than two years of living with the COVID-19 pandemic and with cases on the rise again, the virus continues to dictate hospital payment proposals for fiscal 2023. Here's a look at how at how four ideas in the proposed Medicare Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment System rule were shaped by the pandemic, and one that hospital trade groups think ought to be: 1. CMS proposed returning to its typical practice of using the most recent available data to set hospital rates. CMS used 2019 data for 2022 rates when 2020 data was significantly impacted by the virus, believing that cases would decrease in 2022 to the point where pre-COVID-19 data would be more useful for rate-setting. But COVID-19 still hasn't gone away, and CMS said using 2021 claims and 2020 cost data with some modifications seems appropriate since Medicare patients will likely continue to be hospitalized with COVID-19 in 2023. (Goldman, 4/19)

Modern Healthcare: Kaiser Permanente, Cigna Ink Network, Pharmacy Services Agreement
Kaiser Permanente has negotiated its first partnership to use a rival insurer's commercial network, beginning in August. Under the five-year agreement announced Tuesday, Kaiser's more than 9 million members seeking emergency care while traveling outside the eight states served by the Oakland, California-based system can visit providers contracted with Cigna. Kaiser members will be responsible for the standard cost-sharing associated with their plan rather than paying out-of-network benefits. When Kaiser patients visit Cigna providers, their bills will be routed through Cigna's Evernorth healthcare services division, a spokesperson said. The deal is intended to lower patient costs, streamline administrative services and increase healthcare access. (Tepper, 4/19)

Des Moines Register: Des Moines-Based MercyOne Hospital To Be Taken Over By Trinity Health
Nonprofit Catholic health care organization Trinity Health plans to acquire all facilities and assets of Iowa-based MercyOne Health System, a move expected to be completed in summer 2022. During a conference call announcing the move Tuesday, Mike Slubowski, president and CEO of Trinity Health, said Iowa will now become the second largest regional health system in his company's portfolio. The Livonia, Michigan-based health care provider operates in 25 states and generates a "little over $20 billion in revenues." (Lane, 4/19)

Also —

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Atlanta Doctor Builds ‘Star Wars’ X-Wing Starfighter To Inspire Kids, Raise Money For Ukraine
In 2016, Atlanta doctor Akaki Lekiachvili had a vision to encourage kids to get into the sciences: build a “Star Wars” X-wing starfighter. But not just a small model. Those are available at Hobby Lobby and in Lego form. Lekiachvili, who works at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, decided to create something that was much closer to life size. In fact, he would have loved to have built one to scale but it wouldn’t fit in his garage. So he opted instead for two-thirds actual size. The recently completed X-wing starfighter is still an impressive 26 feet long and 23 feet wide with four microcomputers controlling various functions including a cockpit with cameras, sounds of lasers blasting and the voices of R2D2 and Obi-Wan Kenobi. (Ho, 4/19)