Healthcare Strategic Management articles from September 2001

Healthcare Strategic Management archives from September 2001

Market Memo: Bariatric surgery programs growing quickly nationwide.(Statistical Data Included)
September 1, 2001... Hundreds of hospitals nationwide have launched bariatric treatment centers and bariatric surgery programs to treat the millions of people who are morbidly obese in this country. And more hospitals of all sizes are racing headlong into weight...

Hospitals need to look at body scan centers.(Consumers want full body MRI scans)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... Consumers are deciding that they want full body MRI scans that will either detect diseases early or give them clean bills of health. Entrepreneurial radiologists and startup companies appear to be responding to the demand for such uninsured...

VHA adds outsourcing deals for drug testing, MRI/PET, medical fitness centers.(VHA Inc. outsources magnetic resonance imaging and positron emission tomography services)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... VHA Inc., Irving, Texas, signed agreements with three companies to offer three more outsourcing services to VHA's member health care organizations. VHA has more than 30 such agreements. Its new agreements are with: * Drugtest.com,...

Sleep Clinic of San Francisco plans network of sleep centers in the Bay Area.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... The Sleep Clinic of San Francisco, a privately held medical group headquartered in San Francisco, plans to open a chain of sleep centers in the Bay Area. Each clinic will be designed to provide comprehensive patient care for sleeping...

America's children are in better health; fewer live in poverty.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
September 1, 2001... America's children are in better health, according to the Federal government's fifth annual report, America's Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being, 2001. The child poverty rate continued to decline between 1998 and 1999, with...

California's coronary artery bypass graft death rate is 2.6%.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
September 1, 2001... The chances of dying from coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery in California are quite low. The overall in-hospital death rate associated with the procedure is 2.6%, according to the first evaluation of how well California hospitals...

1.5 million people a year sustain traumatic brain injury; 230,000 are hospitalized.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
September 1, 2001... The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate that at least 1.5 million Americans sustain a traumatic brain injury (TBI) annually, of whom more than 230,000 are hospitalized and survive and 80,000 experience the onset of...

PhDx introduces Web-based applications for measuring orthopaedic outcomes.(PhDx e-Systems)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... PhDx e-SYSTEMS, a provider of Web-based application services for supporting population health and disease management programs, launched PhDx(R) Orthopaedic applications for measuring patient outcomes. The Web-based application series consists...

Increased usage will boost drug costs for payers and consumers 15% to 16% in 2001.(managed care pharmacy costs)(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
September 1, 2001... Managed care pharmacy costs will rise an average of 15% in 2001, according to HMO pharmacy executives participating in Benefit Design: How It's Changing Managed Care, a new study by Scott-Levin. Pharmacy executives from pharmacy benefit...

Hospitals can look forward to growing demand for colonoscopy screening for colon cancer.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... Hospital's ambulatory care departments and surgery centers will be kept busy with colonoscopy screening for colon cancer as a result of an editorial in the Aug. 23, 2001 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine. In the article, Alan S....

Hospitals and clinicians are unhappy with available safety needles and syringes.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... Finding safety needles that meet the needs of hospitals for patient care is proving to be more frustrating than expected, according to materials managers attending the annual meeting of the Assn. for Hospital Resource and Materials Management,...

Coney Island Hospital focuses on health care for Brooklyn's ethnic groups.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... Coney Island Hospital, one of New York City's public hospitals, serves the south Brooklyn shore, home to a rich combination of immigrants from Latin, Middle Eastern and Asian countries, and 40% of its outpatients hail from the former Soviet...

Branding effort shows MetroHealth knows `how people should be treated'.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... The MetroHealth System, Cleveland, Ohio, is conducting a full-fledged branding campaign that is saturating its marketplace with the message that MetroHealth knows "How people should be treated," according to Healthcare Advertising Review. ...

What it takes to launch a successful program.(bariatric surgery )(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... Time, money and organization are needed to get a fully integrated bariatric surgery program off the ground. Some experts say it'll take a hospital one year after there's a qualified surgeon/medical director in place to develop and implement an...

Key elements for success of a bariatric program.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... The list of elements that should be in place for a hospital to make a success of its bariatric surgery program is long and complex. Nearly every hospital with a successful program appears to have entered the business because a surgeon on staff...

BC of Calif. cuts coverage for duodenal switches.
September 1, 2001... Blue Cross of California, a subsidiary of Wellpoint Corp., Fountain Valley, Calif., in May, 2001, eliminated coverage for a newer and less common bariatric procedure called duodenal switch (DS), which is performed by fewer than 40 surgeons...

Fine-tuning a bariatric program brings success and growth to Peoria's St. Francis Medical Center.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... The experience of OSF St. Francis Medical Center in Peoria, Ill., demonstrates the value of having bariatric surgeons work collaboratively with hospital personnel to develop an integrated program. In many ways, St. Francis's lessons make it...

ACS offers guidelines for hospitals doing WLS.(American College of Surgeons recommendations for weight loss surgery)(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... The American College of Surgeons committee on emerging surgical technology issued recommendations last year for facilities performing bariatric surger. These are available online at www.facs.org.fellowsinfo/ statements/st-34.html. ACS...

Mini-gastric bypass sparks furor over safety issues.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... The Laparoscopic Obesity Surgery Assn. (LOSA) recently created a public information Web site to roundly condemn a type of procedure known as the "mini-gastric bypass" or MGB that is being aggressively promoted by at least one surgeon on the...

Bariatric surgery Web sites are plentiful.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2001... Surgeons who perform bariatric surgery procedures invariably have their own Web sites, providing extensive information about the surgeon or surgeons in the group, their credentials, and detailed clinical explanations of the WLS surgery they...

Special Bariatric Patient Needs: The Hospital.
September 1, 2001... * Suitable exam tables * OR tables meeting OSHA standards * Hoya lift * HoverMatt * Special surgical instruments * Large size beds * Access to beds accommodating super-obese * Large blood pressure cuffs *...