health care organization

We have repeatedly discussed the adverse effects of conflicts of interest on health care.  Recently, I argued that the most pernicious are conflicts of interest created as an incentive for trusted health care leaders, usually respected health care professionals or academics, to promote the vested interests of those who pay them, in the guise of the leaders' professional roles.  In this capacity, the leaders are often dubbed "key opinion leaders" by those who employ them, but may be rega

Before it was abruptly ended by a sudden settlement for $158 million, the trial in Texas of a suit alleging unethical marketing of the drug Respirdal (risperidone) by the Janssen subsidiary of Johnson and Johnson opened yet another window on organized stealth marketing campaigns in health care.

(Note that we first discussed this case here in 2006, and that this trial and the case was ably covered in detail on the 1BoringOldMan blog.) 

As the leadership of the large field of Republican candidates for the US Presidency shifts, different candidates come in for increased media scrutiny.  Recently, reporting about former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum focused on his financial relationships with a health care organization. Senator Santorum, however, is only the candidate with ties to health care organizations to come into the spotlight most recently.  We will review the report on Santorum, and then summarize the publicly known relationships of the other candidates.

Last year, we noted concerns about the againy fashionable practice of for-profit corporations taking over previously not-for-profit hospitals and hospital systems.

Two examples we cited were the planned acquisitions of Detroit Medical Center (DMC) by Vanguard Health, which was owned by the Blackstone Group, and of Caritas Christi Health Care by Cerberus Capital Management.

From Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview blog, an aggregation of stories that shows how the famous Susan G Komen For the Cure foundation has lost its way.  Not only is this organization using its financial resources to launch legal challenges to other charities that dare to use the phrase "for the cure," but it now has joined a corporate partnership to sell&n

We open the week with yet another story of a large health care organization found by the judicial process to have misbehaved.

Here is the story, courtesy of the Kansas City InfoZine:

The revelations about the huge golden parachute given the outgoing CEO of ostensibly non-profit Massachusetts Blue Cross Blue Shield induced some public discussion about the disconnect between executive compensation and the mission of health care organization (see most recent post here).  Several other recent stories should generate more discussion on these issues. 

In late February, there have been several notable legal settlements made by more or less prominent hospitals, discussed in rough order of size.

United Regional Health Care System

Per the Cypress Times,

Back in November, 2010, we discussed the relatively opulent pay and perks given to and conflicts of interest affecting leaders of Passport Health Plan, a non-profit, state (Kentucky) supported Medicaid managed care organization/ health insurer.  This seemed to be another case of health care organizational insiders putting their personal gain ahead of their mission, which was particularly unseemly because their mission was serving the poor. 

Some recent publications raise interesting questions about the leadership of a regional health care organization which now seems to have intentions of going national. 

A Superbowl Ad for Steward Health Care