Physician owned Hospital Controversy
As the controversy over physician owned hospitals continue, the report that came out from the HHS’ inspector general’s office regarding the emergency-care policies has now been able to be reviewed and the so-called facts challenged and refuted.
What follows is a summary by Molly Sandvig of Physician Hospitals of America
The hospitals in the report have now been contacted and the Physicians Hospital Association (PHA) and they state that virtually all of the report’s “facts” and conclusions that relate to hospital compliance with federal staffing requirements and emergency policies are wrong.
The inspector general’s office suggests that certain policies regarding emergency response and patient transfers might violate Medicare’s conditions of participation but this suggestion is without merit.
All of the hospitals have been surveyed and inspected as part of the process of obtaining Medicare certification and review of policies is part of the survey process.
The real question is that if these policies were acceptable to the CMS and other independent accrediting bodies; on what basis does the inspector general now challenge their legitimacy?
PHA also stated that the inspector general’s office concluded that 37 of these hospitals allegedly use 911 as a substitute for the hospital’s ability to stabilize its patients.
But so far, 29 of these hospitals have challenged this conclusion and provided documentation to PHA that supports this reaction.
These hospitals said the inspector general’s office made no effort to allow these facilities to answer these allegations prior to the report’s publication.
In addition, the inspector general’s office listed eight hospitals that had supposedly violated Medicare conditions of participation due to improper staffing and once again, all eight of the named hospitals have come forward with documentation showing that they were, in fact, properly staffed according to CMS guidelines during the times in question.
Other criticisms of the report are that the inspector general’s office reported the number of hospitals with emergency rooms and the size of those ERs, however, the report made no mention of the fact that these issues are controlled by state law and each met their state requirements.
Many of the hospitals named are five-star ranked and/or listed by independent quality authorities as the No. 1 hospital in their specialty and state.
The inspector general’s report does a disservice both to the medical professionals of these hospitals and, more critically, to the patients who are served by them.
In the PHA’s opinion, the inspector general’s report is either an example of lazy reporting, failure to understand standard hospital policies and procedure, or blatant and purposeful misrepresentation.
The PHA and physician-owned specialty hospitals are outraged by the inspector general’s willingness to release such an erroneous report and by the failure of many in the media to seek independent confirmation of the report’s allegations.
So what was the real motivating factors behind the report?
What follows is a summary by Molly Sandvig of Physician Hospitals of America
The hospitals in the report have now been contacted and the Physicians Hospital Association (PHA) and they state that virtually all of the report’s “facts” and conclusions that relate to hospital compliance with federal staffing requirements and emergency policies are wrong.
The inspector general’s office suggests that certain policies regarding emergency response and patient transfers might violate Medicare’s conditions of participation but this suggestion is without merit.
All of the hospitals have been surveyed and inspected as part of the process of obtaining Medicare certification and review of policies is part of the survey process.
The real question is that if these policies were acceptable to the CMS and other independent accrediting bodies; on what basis does the inspector general now challenge their legitimacy?
PHA also stated that the inspector general’s office concluded that 37 of these hospitals allegedly use 911 as a substitute for the hospital’s ability to stabilize its patients.
But so far, 29 of these hospitals have challenged this conclusion and provided documentation to PHA that supports this reaction.
These hospitals said the inspector general’s office made no effort to allow these facilities to answer these allegations prior to the report’s publication.
In addition, the inspector general’s office listed eight hospitals that had supposedly violated Medicare conditions of participation due to improper staffing and once again, all eight of the named hospitals have come forward with documentation showing that they were, in fact, properly staffed according to CMS guidelines during the times in question.
Other criticisms of the report are that the inspector general’s office reported the number of hospitals with emergency rooms and the size of those ERs, however, the report made no mention of the fact that these issues are controlled by state law and each met their state requirements.
Many of the hospitals named are five-star ranked and/or listed by independent quality authorities as the No. 1 hospital in their specialty and state.
The inspector general’s report does a disservice both to the medical professionals of these hospitals and, more critically, to the patients who are served by them.
In the PHA’s opinion, the inspector general’s report is either an example of lazy reporting, failure to understand standard hospital policies and procedure, or blatant and purposeful misrepresentation.
The PHA and physician-owned specialty hospitals are outraged by the inspector general’s willingness to release such an erroneous report and by the failure of many in the media to seek independent confirmation of the report’s allegations.
So what was the real motivating factors behind the report?
Labels: controversy, hospital, physician-owned
posted by Anonymous at 5:54 AM
1 Comments:
I have no idea what the motivating factor was behind the Inspector General report. But I am 100% certain what motivates the rebuttal authored by the advocacy group for Physician owned hospitals. Using that group as an unbiased source is the rough equivalent of having you rebut the scientific theory of evolution.
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