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Workers and employers are drowning in their health insurance premiums. The reason for that deluge: the health care industry’s high and inscrutable prices. (Herman, 10/5)

A gaggle of doctors in white coats gathered at the Virginia state capitol in Richmond on Friday to make their case that the safety of their patients and their ability to practice medicine is threatened by an upcoming referendum to enshrine abortion protections in the commonwealth’s constitution. Thousands of miles away, hundreds of doctors in Idaho were making the opposite case — that physicians in general and ob-gyns in particular would continue to flee the state in alarming numbers unless voters passed a ballot measure to overturn the state’s ban on abortion. (Ollstein, 10/3)

As they walked out the main door of Mercy Medical Center in the early hours of Thursday morning, there were squeals of surprise – along with plenty of laughter and chatter as this army of labor and delivery nurses was greeted with posters, flowers and bear hugs from mothers who had given birth at the Aurora hospital. It seemed like a celebration. Except for the tears. (Crosby, 10/4)

Health systems are broadening efforts to steer patients who don’t need emergency care to more appropriate lower-cost settings. Providers look to increase revenue and lower operating costs by expanding care-navigation programs and sites outside of the hospital, to free emergency department capacity for high-acuity cases. The push comes as they race against Affordable Care Act and Medicaid policy changes that are poised to increase emergency department utilization over the next year. (Kacik, 10/2)

HCA Healthcare has completed a deal to sell 31 home health and hospice locations in eight states to Deaconess Associations. The former HCA sites and their employees are now part of Deaconess subsidiary Central Pyramid, the Cincinnati-based provider announced in a news release Thursday. Neither Deaconess nor Nashville, Tennessee-based HCA disclosed the financial terms of the transaction. (Eastabrook, 10/2)

Unannounced drills that used professional actors posing as patients exposed some gaps in how healthcare facilities respond to a potential infectious disease outbreak, according to a study of three jurisdictions. (Rudd, 10/2)

�������ýҕ�l Health News: �������ýҕ�l Health News’ ‘An Arm and a Leg’: Medicare Is More Broken Than We Thought

By Oct. 1, at least 2 million seniors will have received alarming notices: Their health plans — which they get through Medicare Advantage, the version of Medicare run by private health insurance companies — will disappear at the end of the year. Many will be stuck without a lot of options. In some cases, no other companies in their area may offer Medicare Advantage plans to replace them. This isn’t the first time this has happened. Last year, almost 3 million seniors found themselves in similar situations. (Weissmann, 10/5)

The U.S. market for soft-tissue robotic surgery systems is becoming more competitive, giving hospitals more options as they weigh technology, workflow and purchasing arrangements. Johnson & Johnson MedTech has commercially launched the Ottava Robotic Surgical System with select customers in the U.S. after receiving authorization from the Food and Drug Administration this summer.The company is planning a gradual rollout, initially focusing on hospitals with high-volume surgical robotics programs, a company spokesperson said. (Dubinsky, 10/2)

Bob Diamond, erstwhile chief executive officer of Barclays, only intended to ditch alcohol for a month. He’s barely touched a drop for nearly three years, he was so horrified by the dive in scores on his fitness tracker when he tried to resume his “wine with dinner” lifestyle. Diamond didn’t feel like he was “over-drinking” to begin with, but the data “showed me clearly the impact of wine at dinner versus no wine at dinner,” he said. An early Fitbit user, he’s since switched to a Whoop band to monitor his heart rate and other physical signs of stress. (Noonan, 10/3)

Stem cell entrepreneur Chuck Meeker is bullish about his industry’s prospects with the Food and Drug Administration nowadays. “If I were a betting man, I would say before the end of the year we have a series of FDA roundtables happening,” Meeker told STAT at PepMed 2026, a conference for regenerative health businesses held by the American Academy of Peptide Medicine. (The FDA declined to say whether such events were imminent.) (Manto, 10/5)

�������ýҕ�l Health News: Doctors Should Keep An Eye On Your Mix Of Medication. If They Don’t, You Should

Medications can snowball as we age. Pill organizers pile up. Prescriptions that are no longer necessary can mix with other drugs to create concerning side effects. “Once you get to six or seven prescription medications, you get a nearly 100% chance of some sort of side effect or intolerance,” said physician K. Eric De Jonge, director of geriatrics at MedStar Washington Hospital Center. (Span, 10/5)