Regional Digest
Regional Digest
• Canada’s Progressive Conservative Party Leader Mike Harris has caused nothing but trouble for home health patients, said Ontario NDP Leader Howard Hampton in a statement. Hampton cites the example of Bernard Lorenzi of Sault Ste. Marie, ON, who has had his home care cut from seven days a week to three because Harris took money out of healthcare "to pay for his tax cut to the wealthy." Hampton said his party will invest $250 million more in home nursing, homemaking, and personal support services. Lorenzi has a diabetic ulcer and began receiving home nursing care from the Algoma Victorian Order of Nurses in October 1997. But Harris had contracts awarded to the lowest bidder, giving Olsten Health Services (Melville, NY) half the government contracts and St. Mary’s Home Health Care the other half, Hampton said. That is when Lorenzi’s services were cut. "If you’re one of the wealthiest 6% getting Mike Harris’s $4.1 million-a-day tax cut, that’s not a problem," Hampton said. "But that leaves 94% of us at the mercy of a home care system where profits, not care, is the bottom line."
• The executive director of the Visiting Nurses of Aroostook (VNA; Bangor, ME) riled other home healthcare agency officials when she told the Madawaska Board of Selectmen that VNA was the only Medicare-approved agency in the county to provide acute care, reported the Bangor Daily News. Saundra Scott-Adams made the statement while asking for a grant to help the agency through a fiscal crunch. Administrators at Madigan Home Health (Houlton, ME) and Valley Home Health (Madawaska, ME) disagreed with Scott-Adams’ statement. "We are all approved by Medicare," said one administrator. VNA wants to raise $500,000 to cover its 1998 operating losses by receiving grants from five Aroostook County communities and two statewide agencies, the News reported.
• A three-judge panel in the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Jeanette Garrison, the founder of Healthmaster, must pay a $2.5 million fine for committing Medicare fraud. Garrison, who was convicted in 1995 after pleading guilty, used her home healthcare company to file false claims. She appealed the fine because she already paid $16.5 million in restitution. At its peak, reported The Augusta (GA) Chronicle, Healthmaster operated 125 offices in five states and cost Medicare about $100 million a year. It was sold in 1996 for $54.7 million to Medical Center of Central Georgia (Macon, GA).
• The Department of Labor received an emergency grant of up to $1 million to help laid-off workers of Lifespan hospital network and home healthcare agencies in Providence, RI. A total of $333,000 of the money is available immediately to the state and will pay for career counseling, job retraining, and other support services. The grant is part of a federal program that helps people who lose their jobs because of government actions, changes in technology, or foreign competition, reported The Providence Journal. More than 400 healthcare workers in Rhode Island have lost jobs within the last three months.
• Officials with the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Medicaid Fraud Control Unit say patient abuse is one of the fastest growing areas of investigation, reported the Knoxville News-Sentinel. The abuse rape, sexual assault, theft of patients’ money, emotional abuse accounts for more than a quarter of the unit’s caseload. The unit handles cases involving victims of state-funded nursing homes or state-paid home healthcare services. Investigators want legislation that allows them to place patient abusers on a registry similar to one used to identify sex offenders.
• Illinois Sen. Christine Radogno has sponsored the Illinois Senate Resolution to urge the federal government to correct hardship created on home health providers by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. The resolution, supported by the Illinois Home Care Council (IHCC) and approved by the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee, will soon go before the full Senate for further consideration. IHCC Executive Director Michael Kulczycki said that 58 home healthcare agencies or branches have closed in the state in the past year.
• More than 50 mentally handicapped or developmentally disabled people, healthcare advocates, and others asked the Louisiana House Appropriations Committee to reduce long waiting lists for home care services. As many as 10,000 people are waiting for the services, reported the New Orleans Times-Picayune. Gov. Mike Foster’s administration has proposed paying for 800 people on the waiting list under the Medicaid waiver program, raising the number of those receiving care to 3,500. It would cost the state $3.4 million and another $8 million in matching federal money. The added home care is being pushed by many advocates who charge that Louisiana relies too heavily on institutions, reported the Times.
• Independent Living (Madison, WI), which offers home healthcare for seniors, has bought Attic Angel Association’s Health Center and Tower in Madison for an undisclosed price. Independent Living Executive Director Rita Giovannoni said she expects more than 100 senior housing units will be available at Health Center. The current residents will move to a newer facility, owned by Attic Angel. Independent Living is now operating senior residential facilities, but its core business is providing services to older adults in Dane County, reported the Wisconsin State Journal.
• Franciscan Health Partnership (Latham, NY) is divesting all of its facilities, transferring its operations to Bon Secours Health System (Marriottsville, MD). Franciscan called off a merger deal with Catholic Healthcare Partners (Cincinnati) in January and transferred some hospitals and facilities to Catholic in April. All that remains goes to Bon Secours.
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