News

The North Carolina Hospital Foundation, a 501(c)(3) affiliate of the NC Healthcare Association, has established a disaster relief fund to support North Carolina health care workers who suffered significant property loss to their homes during Hurricane Florence and the subsequent flooding.

The Senate today voted 93-7 to pass legislation that would provide $178.1 billion in discretionary funding for the departments of Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education in fiscal year 2019 and extend current funding levels for other federal programs until Dec. 7.

President Trump today announced a National Biodefense Strategy to “more effectively prepare for and combat biological threats.”

The Senate last night voted 98-2 to approve the Patient Right to Know Drug Prices Act (S. 2554), a bill that would prohibit private health plans from restricting a pharmacist’s ability to inform enrollees when a drug would cost less without using their insurance.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has released a list of Medicaid payment arrangements that will qualify as advanced Alternative Payment Models for performance year 2019 under the Quality Payment Program’s all-payer combination option.

Oregon’s hospitals are again spending more on charity care despite having one of the lowest rates of uninsured residents in the country.

Leaders from the AHA and individual 340B hospitals today came together to announce new principles for ensuring good stewardship of the 340B program. The new AHA-led initiative seeks to strengthen the 340B program by increasing transparency while helping 340B hospitals better publicly communicate the value of the program for vulnerable patients and communities.

The Senate Sept. 17 passed the Opioid Crisis Response Act, a substitute amendment to the House-passed opioid package (H.R. 6).

Join representatives from the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response and others Sept. 20 for a webinar on outbreak response and incident management.

Cigna Corp. and Express Scripts today announced that the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division has cleared their pending merger, terminating the applicable waiting period under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act.

Clinicians should be alert for signs of carbon monoxide poisoning when treating patients from areas affected by Hurricane Florence, especially those without power, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in an advisory yesterday.

Eligible hospitals and critical access hospitals can now submit electronic clinical quality measure data for the calendar year 2018 reporting period for the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting Program and the Promoting Interoperability Program.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration will review results from the Zero Suicide Workforce Survey during a webinar tomorrow at 1:30 p.m. ET.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services today released a proposed rule to reduce health care provider regulatory burden associated with certain Medicare and Medicaid Conditions of Participation and Conditions for Coverage.

The AHA offers comprehensive cybersecurity resources and risk advisory services for hospital and health systems leaders.

The House and Senate conference committee yesterday approved legislation that would provide $178.1 billion in discretionary funding for the departments of Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education in fiscal year 2019 and extend current funding levels for other federal programs until Dec. 7.

Hurricane Florence made landfall this morning along the North Carolina coast, where hospitals were anticipating additional traffic to emergency departments and potential admissions of injured and medically fragile individuals.

The House Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee yesterday held a hearing examining legal and regulatory barriers to innovation and value-based care in Medicare.

The number of U.S. residents using heroin for the first time fell by more than 50 percent in 2017, according to the latest National Survey on Drug Use and Health.

Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh yesterday filed a federal lawsuit seeking a declaratory judgment that the Affordable Care Act is constitutional and the federal government must stop taking actions to dismantle it.