ViewPoints Blog

In May, media stories highlighted the filing of a lawsuit in federal court in Alabama alleging that the 37 Blue Cross and Blue Shield health insurers are functioning as an illegal cartel.

Large hospital operators HCA, Tenet and Community Health Systems recently issued robust earnings, revenues and large declines in uncompensated care costs, a key measure of expenses. These statements from some of the country’s largest for-profit health systems has some in the industry trumpeting the end to hospital bad debt.

As you may have seen, iVantage was an active sponsor and participant at the Rural Medicine Hackathon, held last weekend in Montana. We think it was a unique opportunity to help rural healthcare providers and our clients advance new solutions. But how?

Whether it’s conducting managed care-themed seminars or speaking one-on-one with executives, I receive a lot of questions about the negotiation process. Everyone wants tips and tidbits they can take to their next payor negotiation.

At this week’s Rural Health Policy Institute in Washington, DC, we presented key findings from our INDEX analysis regarding hospital closures. Forty-seven rural hospitals have closed since the beginning of the decade and in October, we leveraged the Hospital Strength INDEX to evaluate these 47 hospital closures and developed the Vulnerability Index™ with NRHA.

Last week, HHS Secretary Sylvia M. Burwell announced ambitious plans to move from “volume to value in Medicare payments” by accelerating the share of Medicare fee-for-service (FFS) payments that are tied to quality and value and reimbursed through alternative payment models. For rural hospitals in America, the implementation of Medicare’s Value-Based Purchasing (VBP) program has long loomed as a financial time bomb.

While the calendar may have changed to 2015, much of the uncertainty and adjustment to change that defined last year will persist. This prolonged state of fluctuation only further emphasizes the importance of measuring opportunity and risk across specific payors, service lines, and markets.

When I joined iVantage a few years ago, discussions with strategic planners about market share always focused on other hospitals. But today, that conversation is more complex. Urgent care clinics and “doc in the box” facilities are sprouting up in strip malls and inside retail pharmacies nationwide.