Friday Five: Top 5 healthcare business news items from the MCOL Weekend edition

Every business day, MCOL posts feature stories making news on the business of health care. Here are five we think are particularly important for this week:

Why Hospitals Are Getting Into The Housing Business

One patient at Denver Health, the city’s largest safety net hospital, occupied a bed for more than four years — a hospital record of 1,558 days. Another admitted for a hard-to-treat bacterial infection needed eight weeks of at-home IV antibiotics, but had no home.

Kaiser Health News

Friday, October 4, 2019

Humana's chief strategy officer: Insurance giant is shifting to be a healthcare company

Insurance giant Humana operates a mail-order pharmacy, has more than 230 owned or alliance primary care clinics and a large home health care provider, Kindred at Home. And the payer continues to build out capabilities to address members' social determinants of health.

Fierce Healthcare

Thursday, October 3, 2019

Trump signs executive order bolstering MA in pushback on 'Medicare for All'

President Donald Trump signed an executive order in Florida on Thursday he said would bolster the Medicare program as numerous Democratic presidential candidates seek to expand the program beyond seniors, a move Trump said would jeopardize the entire program.

Healthcare Dive

Thursday, October 3, 2019

US vaping illnesses top 1,000; death count is up to 18

The number of vaping-related illnesses has surpassed 1,000, and there’s no sign the outbreak is fading, U.S. health officials said Thursday.

The Associated Press

Thursday, October 3, 2019

Walmart To Give Workers Financial Incentives To Use Higher-Quality Doctors

Worried its employees aren’t getting good enough care from doctors in their insurance networks, Walmart next year will test pointing workers in northwestern Arkansas, central Florida and the Dallas-Fort Worth area toward physicians it has found provide better service.

Kaiser Health News

Thursday, October 3, 2019

These and more weekly news items on the business of healthcare are featured in the MCOL Weekend edition, along with the MCOL Tidbits, and more, for MCOL Premium level members.