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

Iowa News

Q-C hospitals beef up fight against infections
Both Genesis Health System and Trinity Regional Health System have beefed up hand hygiene programs, required influenza vaccinations and established procedures to encourage employees to check and challenge each other in regards to cleanliness. (Quad-City Times)

Local health providers respond to bill
Kurt Carlson, M.D., chief medical officer with Winneshiek Medical Center said, “One of the reasons the current model of health care is not sustainable, is because the incentive for physicians to focus on quality and value is missing. If reimbursement was outcome-based, health-care organizations would find ways to improve their quality outcomes to benefit from higher reimbursement.” (Decorah Journal)

Agency works to prevent Medicare fraud
Shirley Merner greets news of big Medicare fraud crackdowns in big cities across the nation with mixed feelings. She’s thrilled that a new federal program is busting up crime rings and saving millions of dollars in federal money. But she fears that could drive con artists out of Los Angeles, Houston, Miami and Detroit and in to Iowa. (Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier)

Weekend fundraisers a rousing success
As a result of the generosity of area businesses and patrons who attended both events, Avera Holy Family Health will be able to add much-needed equipment, improving quality care for its patients and the Emmet County Nature Center Foundation will be able to pay down the debt of the Nature Center, saving taxpayers money. (Estherville Daily News)

U.S. News

Health law does little to curb overuse of care
To truly change the nation’s chronic overuse of medical care, there will have to be a substantial change in the way patients think about health care, how medicine is practiced and how it is paid for, economists and doctors say. The legislation does little to help in those areas. (New York Times)

Stimulus stumbles hold lessons for health care sell
As President Barack Obama prepares to roll out the health care reform plan, he can look to one recent case study in how not to do it — the economic stimulus package. Health reform is a chance for voters to see if the White House can learn from its mistakes. Here are the lessons from the stimulus Democrats hope to apply to selling health reform. (Politico)

Companies push to repeal provision of health law
The American Benefits Council said the provision — which reduces the tax deductions for companies with drug coverage for their retired employees — would deal a significant blow to corporate profits and would discourage companies from hiring more workers. (New York Times)

Insurance industry agrees to fix kids coverage gap
The insurance industry says it won’t fight President Barack Obama over fixing a coverage gap for kids in the new health care law. In a letter Monday to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, the industry’s top lobbyist says insurers will accept new regulations to dispel uncertainty over a much publicized guarantee that children with pre-existing medical problems can get coverage starting this year. (Associated Press)

Politics makes strange bedfellows in fight against nonprofit hospitals
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) have formed an unusual alliance to ensure that tax-exempt hospitals treat patients without insurance. Nonprofit hospitals receive tens of billions of dollars in tax benefits each year to offer medical assistance to patients who lack proper coverage. But some have curtailed this care to boost their bottom line. (The Hill)

Hospitals giving more charity care
“Government must not back away from its role in the partnership that provides tax exemptions to hospitals. Taxing hospitals, many of which are struggling to survive, would destabilize the health-care delivery system and the health care safety net that they provide their communities,” said the CEO of the Illinois Hospital Association.  (Chicago Sun-Times)

New worries about H1N1 influenza
Although H1N1 flu activity is still low in most of the country, flu-related hospitalizations in Georgia have, since the beginning of February, been higher than they were in October at the height of the second wave of the flu, said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. A CDC team was sent March 6 to assist state officials investigating the outbreak, but its members have found nothing unusual. (Los Angeles Times)

Increase in number of ‘observation cases’ costly to hospitals
During the past year, Medicare and commercial insurers increasingly have labeled patients as “observation cases,” saying they’re not sick enough to be hospitalized — but not well enough to go home. Doctors, hospitals and consumer advocates say the trend is costing patients and hospitals. They say the practice is particularly harmful to Medicare patients. If they are discharged without a record of a three-day inpatient stay, Medicare recipients are denied coverage for skilled nursing home care. (Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)