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As hospital systems and insurers adjust to the pandemic, their contract negotiations grow increasingly fraught. Contracts for in-network care are ending without a new deal, leaving patients suddenly with out-of-network bills or scrambling to find new in-network providers.
Many small hospitals have shuttered their labor and delivery units as births decline. For those who resist the trend, some studies suggest that hospitals with low deliveries are more likely to see complications for patients. Doctors and public health experts say there is no magic number to determine when it is best to close an obstetrics unit.
KHN gives readers a chance to comment on a recent batch of stories.
Hospitals and doctors are facing more demands for ivermectin as a covid-19 treatment, despite a lack of proof it works. In some Republican-dominated states, pushing for ivermectin interventions has become a conservative rallying cry.
In light of the pandemic鈥檚 shocking death toll among seniors, organizations are trying new strategies to help older Americans get better care.
More than 9 in 10 general acute-care hospitals have been penalized at least once in the past decade.
About 21% of patients diagnosed with covid during a hospital stay died, according to data analyzed for KHN. In-hospital rates of spread varied widely and patients had no way of checking them.
The latest iteration of President Joe Biden's social-spending package would close the health insurance gap for at least 2.2 million people, making a huge difference especially in the South, where political opposition has blocked Medicaid expansion.
KHN and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media this week to discuss their stories. Here鈥檚 a collection of their appearances.
Certain patients who couldn't get in to see a doctor earlier in the pandemic, or were avoiding the covid risks inside hospitals, have become too sick to stay away. Many ERs now struggle to cope with an onslaught of demand.
The federal government鈥檚 hospital penalty program finishes its first decade by lowering payments to nearly half the nation鈥檚 hospitals for readmitting too many Medicare patients within a month. Penalties, though often small, are credited with helping reduce the number of patients returning for another Medicare stay within 30 days.
鈥淥bstetrical emergency departments鈥 are a new feature in some hospitals that can inflate medical bills for even the easiest, healthiest births. Just ask the parents of Baby Gus.
The pandemic has so seriously strained already tight state psychiatric hospitals in Georgia, Virginia, Texas and elsewhere that these facilities for the poorest and most vulnerable people with mental illness struggle to admit new patients.
The state鈥檚 unique health system controls what hospitals can charge for services.
Managers are trapped in a pricey hiring cycle, competing for critical care nurses who can monitor covid patients on life support. Some hospitals are looking abroad to replace staffers who quit to become travel nurses or leave the profession.
KHN and California Healthline staff made the rounds on national and local media this week to discuss their stories. Here鈥檚 a collection of their appearances.
The law says nonprofit hospitals are supposed to offer low-income patients financial assistance. But the average person doesn鈥檛 know about it. Here鈥檚 how to get help.
In a practice dating to the 1980s, many hospitals require people with alcohol-related liver disease to complete a period of sobriety before they can be added to the waiting list for a liver. But this thinking may be changing.
Health care workers already bore the brunt of workplace violence in the U.S. Now, tensions from an exhausting pandemic are spilling over into hospitals.
At issue is whether transplant patients who refuse the shots are not only putting themselves at greater risk for serious illness and death from covid-19, but also squandering scarce organs that could benefit others.
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