Literature Review

New program to provide emergency funding to rural hospitalsCapitol Beat, by Dave Williams; 1/17/24A nonprofit health-care organization announced plans ... to help financially struggling rural hospitals in Georgia in danger of closing. Ohio-based CareSource will contribute $5 million in emergency funding to hospitals and hospital-owned nursing homes in rural communities suffering critical cash deficits. Working in partnership with Cumming-based HomeTown Health, which represents rural hospitals across Georgia, the CareSource Rural Access Advancement Program will provide bridge loans to be repaid and reinvested into the program once the recipient has stabilized. Since 2010, nine rural hospitals have closed in Georgia, third-most in the nation.

To tackle financial distress, hospitals, health systems are turning to mergersKFF Health News; 1/19/24Modern Healthcare looks into the phenomenon of rising health care mergers and acquisitions being driven by financial pressures on health providers in the aftermath of the pandemic. Separately, Stateline explains how private equity-backed hospitals can see cutbacks and closures.

15 most common reasons CMS cited a hospital in 2023Becker's Clinical Leadership, by Paige Twenter; 1/17/24Accreditation organizations, including The Joint Commission and DNV Healthcare, completed nearly 4,000 surveys in 2023. [Click on the article for a list of the top 15 citations.]

Study shows 'alarming' sharp increase of colon cancer in younger AmericansThe National Desk, by Jamel Valencia; 1/17/24Colorectal cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in men and the second in women under the age of 50, according to the American Cancer Society's annual report on cancer facts and trends. It indicated that colon cancer moved up from being the fourth leading cause of cancer death in both younger men and women two decades ago to first in men and second in women. Breast cancer leads in women under 50 with 2,251 deaths in 2021.

Hospital study on AI identifies undiagnosed dementia patients coming from LTCMcKnights Senior Living, by Aaron Dorman; 1/16/24A high number of senior living and care residents have dementia on admission, or develop it during their stay, despite never receiving a formal diagnosis. When these “secret” dementia patients, however, have an emergency – say, a fall – and are hospitalized, they can catch the new care team unaware and struggling to make appropriate clinical decisions. To avoid this pitfall, new research is looking at electronic health records to flag individuals who might have dementia, possibly undiagnosed, so that when they arrive at a hospital, the care team is ready. 

Creative thinking needed to save rural hospitalsSouth Dakota Searchlight, by Tom Dean; 1/14/24Over the last 15 years, approximately 150 rural hospitals have closed nationwide. What does it mean? Are these facilities obsolete, no longer needed?  Maybe in a few places, but in the vast majority of communities they provide critically important services. 

In 2024, data will drive IFDHE's discussions on health equityAmerican Hospital Association (AHA) Institute for Diversity and Health Equity (IFDHE), by Joy Lewis; 1/12/24For the Institute for Diversity and Health Equity, 2024 can be summed up in a single phrase: “letting the data speak and guide us.” Data is critical to eliminating health disparities and advancing equity, diversity and inclusion and serves as the starting point. Data shines a light on the experiences of different patient populations who are accessing care. With data, we are able to see different outcomes for these groups, broken down by race, ethnicity, gender, insurance status or socioeconomic status. Data provides context about our patients’ experiences and health outcomes so we might see where the gaps are that need to be closed. Our mission, then, is to make data actionable. This year, we will embark on several initiatives to provide us with the data — both qualitative and quantitative — that will help us take our necessary next steps.

Unity Hospice and Palliative Care awarded five-year General In-Patient Care contract with UTMB HealthPress release, 1/11/24Unity Hospice and Palliative Care, a leader in providing end-of-life care, announced today that it has entered a five-year agreement with the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) Health. Unity will provide general in-patient (GIP) care for all four hospitals within the Health System: Angleton, Clear Lake, League City, and Galveston Campus Hospitals.

Rural hospitals are caught in an aging-infrastructure conundrumFortune, by Markian Hawryluk and KFF Health News; 1/11/24Kevin Stansbury, the CEO of Lincoln Community Hospital in the 800-person town of Hugo, Colorado, is facing a classic Catch-22: He could boost his rural hospital’s revenues by offering hip replacements and shoulder surgeries, but the 64-year-old hospital needs more money to be able to expand its operating room to do those procedures.

Hospice of Cincinnati launches new inpatient unit at Christ HospitalThe Business Journals - Cincinnati Business Courier, by Liz Engel; 1/11/24Christ Hospital is set to debut a new unit at its flagship campus this week, and it serves as a significant expansion for one of the region’s oldest nonprofits.Full access requires a subscription

"We can't save lives without you."PR Newswire, Philadelphia; 1/10/24Gift of Life's Community & Hospital Partners Advance 50-Year Legacy as the Most Generous Region in the Country ... Gift of Life has coordinated 14,196 donors and 39,469 organs for transplant – more than any other U.S. organ procurement organization (OPO) since the inception of our national donation system in 1988. Yet the need for life-saving organs continues to far exceed the number available. Each day, seventeen people die waiting for a transplant and, every ten minutes, another child or adult is added to the national waitlist.

The prevalence of hospital diagnostic errorsBecker's Clinical Leadership, by Paige Twenter; 1/8/24Nearly a fourth of patients who are transferred to intensive care units or die in hospitals are misdiagnosed or have delayed diagnoses, according to research published Jan. 8 in JAMA. In a study of more than 2,400 patient records, researchers employed physician reviewers trained in error adjudications to inspect each EHR for the admission and events leading up to an ICU transfer or death across 90 hospitals.

Hospice and home health care in Estes Park: A 2024 updateEstes Park Trail Gazette, by Dawn Wilson; 1/5/24Estes Park Health Board of Directors and management made the difficult decision to eliminate in-home hospice and home health care services as part of a plan to bring the hospital into a financially secure position. Sunday, Dec. 31, 2023, marked the last day that Estes Park Health provided these services.