Featuring hospital and health care headlines from the media and Web.

Iowa News

Study: City hospitals have $232M economic impact
Mercy Medical Center-Sioux City and St. Luke’s Regional Medical Center generate 2,763 jobs that add more than $232 million to Siouxland’s economy each year, according to a newly released study by the Iowa Hospital Association. In addition, St. Luke’s and Mercy employees spend more than $103 million on retail sales and contribute $6.1 million in state sales tax revenue, the study found. (Sioux City Journal)

U.S., state legislators face health care bill, budget quandary
Health care is a front-burner item for both national and state lawmakers as Congressional leaders prepare to discuss President Barack Obama’s new health proposal Thursday and the Iowa Legislature looks for funds to make up for Medicare and Medicaid shortfalls. (Ames Tribune)

Union leader’s use of ‘scab’ riles state employee
A union leader inadvertently sent e-mail that calls a state worker a derogatory term, and the employee says that hints at the union attitude toward people who are not union members. State worker Joe Anderson said Monday that he thinks that even if nonunion workers are required by law to help pay their “fair share” for certain union services, they would still face discrimination from union officials. (Des Moines Register)

Iowa receives an “A” for addressing children’s dental health needs
The Pew Center on the States released a new report called “The Cost of Delay” that grades how well each state addresses the dental health care needs of its children. Iowa received an “A” grade. (IowaPolitics)

U.S. News

Obama offers new health-care reform proposal
President Obama signaled his determination to forge ahead with a Democratic vision of comprehensive health-care reform as he unveiled on Monday an ambitious proposal that would extend coverage to 31 million people, raise taxes on the wealthy and ratchet up regulations on insurers. (Washington Post)

Medical insurers slam proposed supervision
America’s Health Insurance Plans, the industry’s trade group, said that double-digit premium increases are a sign of higher medical costs, which it said insurers often merely pass on. Karen Ignagni, AHIP’s president, said hospital and doctor bills are 40% to 50% higher than last year, owing in part to biotechnology drugs. (Wall Street Journal)

Helping older nurses stay in the workforce
The nation’s graying nurse workforce is a worrisome trend. The last big survey from the HRSA Bureau of Health Professions found in 2004 that the average RN was 46.8 years old, and that nurses younger than 30 made up only 8 percent of the workforce. That means a large proportion of the workforce is nearing retirement, although the struggling economy has given healthcare a break. (HealthLeaders Media)

Ex-LA hospital owner convicted of Medicare fraud gets prison for recruiting Skid Row patients
The U.S. attorney’s office says 75-year-old Robert Bourseau was sentenced Monday and must pay $4.1 million in restitution for defrauding Medicare and Medi-Cal. Bourseau and Dr. Rudra Sabaratnum co-owned the now-defunct City of Angels Medical Center. Authorities say they paid a recruiter $500,000 between 2004 and 2007 to find homeless people, who received a small fee to undergo unnecessary hospital stays. (Los Angeles Times)

Miami serves as model in Medicare fraud crackdown
In December, federal authorities broke up a $40 million Medicare fraud scheme involving home health care services. Among those arrested was a family doctor who is charged with referring more than 1,200 Medicare recipients for home health services they didn’t need. It was big even by Miami standards. (Miami Herald)

Poll: one of four health care dollars spent on unnecessary medical care
One in four dollars spent on health care in America now pays for unnecessary tests and treatments that physicians order to keep from being sued, according to a new Gallup poll of the nation’s doctors released today by Jackson Healthcare and the Center for Health Transformation. (Fierce Healthcare)

Doctor training aided by drug industry cash
More than half of the nation’s medical residency programs to train doctors in internal medicine accepted financial support from the drug industry, even though three-fourths of the programs’ directors said accepting the aid was “not desirable,” a survey found. (New York Times)