News Briefs
Number of Official Physician Union Drives Soared Over Two Years
While fewer than 10 percent of U.S. physicians are unionized, the number of official union drives among private-sector doctors have skyrocketed in the last two years compared to two decades prior, according to a new JAMA study. Researchers counted 21 union drives in 2023 and 12 in the first five months of 2024, compared to 0-6 drives each year between 2000 and 2022.
(Source: Medscape (free reg. req'd), 2024-12-19)
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Healthcare Expected to See Strong M&A Activity in 2025
Healthcare proved to be a resilient market for mergers and acquisitions in 2024, despite deal volume declining nine percent from 2023. While health services deal volumes declined year-over-year, activity stayed robust throughout 2024, with annual deal volume through November 15 remaining nearly 70 percent higher than the pre-COVID trendline, according to a yearly PwC report published in mid-December.
(Source: FierceHealthcare, 2025-01-06)
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HHS Seeks to Update HIPAA Rule to Boost Cybersecurity
Healthcare organizations may soon be subject to new cybersecurity rules. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is proposing an update to the HIPAA Security Rule that would require covered healthcare entities to bolster their cybersecurity posture.
(Source: Information Week, 2025-01-03)
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States Reining in CON Laws Amid Demand for Healthcare Facilities
States are rolling back Certificate of Need, or CON, laws in the face of growing demand for healthcare and mounting evidence that they might not lower spending. CON laws often require providers to get regulatory approval for large capital expenditures and projects, like some healthcare facilities.
(Source: Healthcare Dive, 2025-01-03)
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Home Health Providers Get Deadline for OASIS Data Collection
The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has laid out an action items timeline for the transition to all-payer Outcome and Assessment Information Set (OASIS) data collection and submission. Broadly, home health providers will be required to collect and submit OASIS data for more patients.
(Source: Home Health Care News, 2024-12-26)
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Hospice M&A Market Cooling After Slew of Deals in 2019, 2020
The hospice mergers and acquisitions market has seen a host of changes in recent years, with buyers and sellers examining a range of risks and opportunities in the field this year. The industry saw a flurry of M&A activity in 2019 and 2020, with record high valuations and deal volume, but subsequent years saw cooling periods that left many operators wondering what's next in store as 2025 unfolds.
(Source: Hospice News, 2025-01-02)
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Doctors' Use of AI Note-Taking During Appointments a Game-Changer
An app that records discussions during doctor's appointments and then uses artificial intelligence to find the relevant information, summarize it, and zap it, within seconds, into each patient’s electronic medical record is a technology that's spreading rapidly throughout doctors' offices across the country, and could soon become a standard part of medical appointments. Healthcare leaders hope the technology will help combat physician burnout by dramatically cutting the amount of time doctors spend on documentation, and they hope it will improve patients' experiences.
(Source: Yahoo News, 2025-01-03)
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FDA Offers AI Medical Device Marketing Submission Suggestions
To support the continued development and marketing of safe and effective medical devices enhanced by artificial intelligence, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration will offer marketing submission recommendations. This will include the documentation and information needed throughout their total product life cycles for regulatory oversight of the safety and efficacy. The guidance, which will be published in the Federal Register, would be the first to provide total product life cycle recommendations for AI-enabled devices, tying together all design, development, maintenance, and documentation recommendations, if and when finalized FDA said in its announcement.
(Source: Healthcare IT News, 2025-01-06)
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AI Gains Ground in Healthcare, Reimbursement Could Be Challenge
Artificial intelligence is poised to become a major force in healthcare. The technology is developing at breakneck speed, and both payers and providers are examining the potential use cases, with one survey from November showing 73 percent of organizations plan on growing their financial commitments to the technology. But because AI is so new there are still some knots left to be untangled.
(Source: Healthcare Finance News, 2024-12-26)
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Ransomware Downtime Costs Health Organizations $1.9M Per Day
Ransomware attacks are having a severe impact on U.S. healthcare organizations, with an alarming escalation in incidents and their consequences, according to a Comparitech report. Each day of downtime due to ransomware costs healthcare organizations an average of $1.9 million, culminating in an estimated $21.9 billion in downtime losses over six years.
(Source: Healthcare IT News, 2024-12-31)
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