Practice Management
When Cleveland Clinic announced a new policy beginning on June 1 that requires patients to pay their out-of-pocket copays when they arrive for their scheduled appointments, it created controversy for the high-profile nonprofit system. If a patient isn’t able to pay upon check-in for nonemergent appointments, it results in the appointment being cancelled. Urgent care is not included in the new policy, so patients visiting any of the Cleveland Clinic’s 42 centers will not need …
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Northwell Health this week announced the completion of its acquisition of Nuvance Health, resulting in the establishment of an integrated regional health system serving the greater New York and Connecticut areas. This new nonprofit entity will serve a combined population of about 13 million consumers with an annual budget of $22.6 billion and a workforce of more than 104,000 employees, including 22,000 nurses and 13,500 providers. The deal brings the network up to 28 hospitals, …
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Over the past few weeks, glucagon-like peptide-1 agonist (GLP-1) drug manufacturers Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk have been sending cease and desist notices to providers that are still advertising generic, compounded versions of their brand name diabetes and weight loss drugs. A shortage of GLP-1 drugs temporarily allowed compounding pharmacies to produce their own versions, but now with the shortage over, the pharmacies must stop and return to filling prescriptions with the manufacturers’ branded products. …
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The Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP) at the University of Minnesota has established the Vaccine Integrity Project to offer vaccine recommendations and to review safety and effectiveness data, according to a press release. The project is guided by public health and policy experts—some of which served in previous positions at the Food and Drug Administration and the National Academy of Medicine—who will offer strategies to leverage scientific evidence for vaccine-related practices. To …
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In the midst of ongoing retail pharmacy store closures, Amazon is pushing ahead on same-day home delivery of prescription medications, aiming to have delivery within reach of about half the U.S. market by the end of the year, according to MedPage Today. The offering seems like a natural complement to Amazon’s growing list of partners delivering telehealth visits and subscription-based digital health services. Walmart launched same-day deliveries less than a year ago and now reaches …
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It’s evident through everyday experience that access to urgent care (UC) can reduce emergency department (ED) congestion and drive better healthcare resource utilization in a community. A literature review published in Cureus recently quantified this same conclusion by analyzing 10 studies conducted between 2015 and 2024, primarily in the United States, which found that the availability of standalone UC centers reduced ED visits by 8% to 17%. One cited study found UC led to a …
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ACA Marketplace health plan enrollment hit a record for the fourth year in a row, according to an analysis from the Kaiser Family Foundation. This year, more than 24 million Americans signed up for plans in the marketplace—more than doubling the enrollment figure from just 5 years ago and triple that of the inaugural marketplace enrollment numbers in 2014. Regionally, enrollment has more than tripled since 2020 in Texas (growing 255%), Mississippi (242%), West Virginia …
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Emergency departments (EDs) will face increased sustainability risks in the near- and long-term future, according to a new report from nonprofit research firm RAND. As EDs struggle with financial prospects and meeting community demand, nearby urgent care operators might see increased volumes of higher-acuity patient visits. Among the leading issues are the fact that some of the necessary services provided in hospital EDs are not directly reimbursed by public or private payers, while at the …
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The demand for glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) medications for weight loss has surged, in part because there is a large population of patients who could potentially benefit from them. Meanwhile, advocates are concerned about the recent widespread distribution of compounded versions of the drugs. Since compounded versions often expect patients to measure doses from vials and use syringes for delivery—instead of premeasured autoinjector pens—compounded options can lead to dosing errors. But the advantage of compounded GLP1s …
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In the latest iteration among floundering commercial retail spaces, landlords are courting healthcare tenants to fill empty storefronts that used to be occupied by department stores and boutiques. Most existing retail spaces have convenient neighborhood locations with enough local traffic to encourage a visit. According to a recent LA Times report, a network of dental offices in California has found early success with this emerging “med-tail” (medical retail) model, treating both scheduled and walk-in patients. …
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