Hospital Partnership
EM Report Card: Maryland Ranks #1 in Emergency Room Quality, But Work Still to Do In Other Areas
January 16th, 2014by: USACS
ACEP’s national EM Report Card, released today, puts Maryland emergency rooms number one in the nation in quality and patient safety. Maryland also ranks high when it comes to public health & injury prevention and disaster preparedness, but still has a lot of work to do on its medical liability environment and access to emergency care.
read articlePosted in Hospital Partnership, Life in the ER
Hospital Capacity Management II: The Surge
November 21st, 2013by: Dr. Robbin Dick
Surge is used when a hospital has reached the point of over-capacity, requiring the hospital to implement a unique processes to allow for decompression. If surging becomes a frequent occurrence in any hospital organization, a sort of “surge fatigue” will occur, when activation means little if anything to associated staff.
read articlePosted in Hospital Partnership, Quality Efficiency Utilization
One Hospital Metric to Rule Them All
November 12th, 2013by: Dr. Michael Cetta
If you had to pick a single metric to measure a hospital, which would you choose? Of course, you can’t boil everything about a hospital down to one, single data point. Defining quality, throughput, and other factors used to evaluate a hospital is difficult business. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) tracks dozens […]
read articlePosted in Hospital Partnership, Quality Efficiency Utilization
Level-of-Care Process Management: Getting it Right the First Time
September 12th, 2013by: USACS
New regulations stemming from the Affordable Care Act and the associated push toward determining the appropriate level-of-care for patients have changed the way in which hospitals utilize resources to make this determination. Managing this process involves getting the determination of level of care early in the decision making process and performing frequent evaluations to determine […]
read articlePosted in Hospital Partnership
What the NY Times Missed In Its Praise of Maryland Healthcare
August 29th, 2013by: Dr. Angelo Falcone
The NY Times on Wednesday published a much needed and fairly adulatory story about the Maryland healthcare system, focusing much of its praise on Western Maryland Health System – a long time MEP partner. The story rightly pointed out two key differences between Maryland’s healthcare system and all the other states. One is the “Total […]
read articlePosted in Future of Healthcare, Hospital Partnership, Observation Care, Transition Care
Who Or What Is Forestalling The Death Of Fee For Service Medicine?
May 7th, 2013by: Dr. Angelo Falcone
With decreasing Medicare payments, rapidly shifting market pressures, and ongoing discussions regarding value and cost in healthcare, by now it should be clear to everyone that fee-for-service is a dying way of delivering care. That is not to say that fee-for-service will not survive in certain circumstances. Particularly in emergency care, it is difficult to integrate […]
read articlePosted in Future of Healthcare, Hospital Partnership
Amid Change, Physicians are Faced With a Choice
April 16th, 2013by: Dr. Angelo Falcone
Amid massive change in our healthcare delivery systems and seismic shifts in many regional markets, physicians are increasingly being faced with a simple choice: be acquired or become employed as part of a large healthcare system, or stay independent while offering a compelling service that hospitals and health systems value. The changes occurring in our […]
read articlePosted in Future of Healthcare, Hospital Partnership
Skating To Where the Puck Will Be In Healthcare
February 19th, 2013by: Dr. Angelo Falcone
A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be. – Wayne Gretzky Recently, I attended an end-of-year review with one of our hospital partner’s executive team. We reviewed our performance for the past year, and discussed mutually strategic goals and how to improve […]
read articlePosted in Future of Healthcare, Hospital Partnership
Should ER Groups Use Locums? Passing the Baton in Connecticut
September 19th, 2012by: Dr. Angelo Falcone
One of the first issues an emergency medicine group must address when they take over a new Emergency Department is whether to employ temporary locums providers to staff the department. The pressure is on to staff up, and many groups use locums as a stop-gap until they have hired full-time emergency physicians. Other groups may […]
read articlePosted in Hospital Partnership, Leadership
When Negotiations Break Down in a Near-Broken Healthcare System
July 17th, 2012by: Dr. Angelo Falcone
As FierceHealthCare reported a few days ago, an emergency physicians group which staffs and manages two Emergency Departments outside Philadelphia has failed to come to an agreement on reimbursement rates with the region’s largest health insurer, Blue Cross. That won’t mean that people insured by Blue Cross will stop coming to the ER, of course. But […]
read articlePosted in Hospital Partnership, Leadership