Hide caption Patient Bob Berquist with Gregory Wagner, a doctor in the emergency department. Berquist, who volunteers at Fauquier Hospital, was admitted for low blood sugar when another nurse noticed he seemed dizzy. John Rose/NPR Hide caption Fauquier Hospital was among the first five hospitals in the nation — and the only one in Virginia — to meet a specific list of criteria that qualifies it as providing truly patient-centered care. John Rose/NPR Hide caption Lisa Spitzer, a registered nurse, is a Planetree program manager and concierge at Fauquier Hospital. She visits patients and offers a friendly ear and a helping hand. John Rose/NPR Hide caption The organic garden outside the hospital supplies the kitchen with fresh vegetables and herbs. Even the wood used for ... Continue reading →
Ricardo Reitmeyer/iStockphoto.com It turns out we may not know nearly as much about all the money spent on health care in the U.S. as we thought we did. But there's a new group that wants to, well, remedy that. The problem, Martin Gaynor, chairman of the Health Care Cost Institute, told Shots, is that "two-thirds of the population has private (health) insurance, but most of the information comes from Medicare." That's because Medicare, being government run, is the only large insurer whose claims information has been available for academics to crunch. In fact, it's been the detailed analysis of Medicare data that's has allowed the Dartmouth Atlas to show the wide variations in health care across the U.S. Still, many have worried that what happens ... Continue reading →
Enlarge Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Dept./AP Bei Bei Shuai, seen in a file photo, was charged with murder in the Jan. 2, 2011, death of her 3-day-old daughter Angel Shuai, after eating rat poison. Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Dept./AP Bei Bei Shuai, seen in a file photo, was charged with murder in the Jan. 2, 2011, death of her 3-day-old daughter Angel Shuai, after eating rat poison. Bei Bei Shuai is a step closer to leaving jail for the first time since March 2011, when she was arrested for the murder of her 3-day-old daughter Angel. The girl, who was delivered by cesarean section, died after Shuai's unsuccessful suicide attempt in Dec. 2010, while she was pregnant. Today a state court in Indianapolis granted the Chinese immigrant ... Continue reading →
Jim Mone/AP Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson announces a lawsuit against Accretive Health in Jan., saying the company failed to protect the confidentiality of health care records for thousands of Minnesota residents. The charges have widened to include the company's tactics in collecting debts. So what do you do when you're accused of hitting up sick patients in the hospital to pay their bills — sometimes even before they get treatment? Well, if you're Chicago-based Accretive Health, under fire by not only the Minnesota Attorney General but key members of Congress and possibly the Obama Administration, you fight fire with fire. You line up your own set of political defenders. To back up a bit, this story began last year with a stolen laptop, which ... Continue reading →
