After revenue rebounds, Hoosier hospitals start hiring again
Hospitals around Indiana have added 2,400 jobs since September as profits, patient visits and insurance coverage all improved.
Hospitals around Indiana have added 2,400 jobs since September as profits, patient visits and insurance coverage all improved.
Anthem turned out unheard of gains in 2014, the first year of Obamacare’s new health insurance overhaul, as Anthem’s customers numbers held steady but their spending with hospitals and doctors plummeted.
State and city leaders spend millions each year to entice companies to move here and add jobs here. But for the second time in three months, Eli Lilly and Co. has shown that the biggest attraction to a company is talented workers.
The CEOs of Eli Lilly and Anthem are being rewarded by investors for taking high-risk approaches to develop breakthrough drugs, make major acquisitions.
The Indianapolis-based drugmaker on Wednesday will release new data from patients taking its Alzheimer’s drug that could show whether the drug has slowed the progression of their disease. That will show investors whether the 45 percent rise in Lilly’s stock price over the past year is justified.
The plan by the Medicare program to require hospitals in Indianapolis and 74 other cities to accept one payment for joint replacement surgeries is a huge step in fixing the crazy prices and spending growth in health care.
The large practice of orthopedic surgeons is in the midst of spending $3.8 million over three years to open seven urgent care clinics specializing in orthopedic-related injuries.
With Anthem and IU Health so hot to trot their anti-smoking bona fides, it’s surprising their responses to The New York Times' stories about the U.S. Chamber of Commerce blocking anti-smoking policies overseas have been so tepid.
The money, known as reinsurance payments, helped MDwise, Anthem, Humana, Assurant and the Physicians Health Plan of Northern Indiana keep a lid on their losses even as lots of new patients with expensive or untreated medical conditions migrated into the private insurance market.
Indiana's life sciences companies are spending four times more on medical research than the state's hospitals, doctors and univerities are receiving from such companies for research projects. That means Indiana is missing out on more than $80 million a year.
Last week’s Supreme Court ruling upholding the tax credits for Obamacare is just the latest in a string of developments that have kept employers from ditching their group health plans, as many predicted they would.
For at least 20 years, Republicans have been pushing for giving tax credits to help individuals buy health insurance. The Supreme Court’s latest Obamacare ruling does Republicans the favor of preserving them.
Cigna said Anthem’s a risky bet due to fallout from its massive data breach, lawsuits that accuse it of conspiring to inflate prices, and lack of a growth strategy. But Wall Street thinks this deal is going to happen, unless Cigna can find another buyer.
But hospitals’ list prices in Indiana are more than three times what the federal Medicare program pays.
If Anthem merged with Cigna Corp. it would create a behemoth with even greater negotiating power, which could benefit employers but hurt doctors and hospitals.
The Obama administration could write a new regulation. Congress could pass a short law. States could run a low-cost exchange. But the politics might require all parties to let the tax credits die while they try to pin the blame on the other side.
Lilly’s basal insulin peglispro proved more effective than the $7 billion blockbuster Lantus at controlling diabetics’ blood sugar, but it also had greater effect on patients’ livers and hearts. Analysts are unsure of its future.
The new version of the Healthy Indiana Plan, backed by Obamacare funding, has enrolled 229,000 new participants in four months without breaking stride.
Wall Street analysts say a purchase of Louisville-based Humana Inc., which reportedly has put itself up for sale, would by Indianapolis-based Anthem. An Anthem-Humana marriage would be the biggest merger in the history of U.S. health insurance.
It took $394,000 to rank in the top 1 percent of U.S. earners in 2013. And more than 100 of the Indiana contingent in that exclusive club were physicians employed by one of the four major hospital systems that operate in the Indianapolis area.