Monday, April 10, 2006
Hospitals Encouraged to Recognize Cover the Uninsured Week
Today, nearly 46 million Americans do not have health insurance and 1.3 million of those are Ohioans. From May 1-7, during the fourth annual Cover the Uninsured Week, thousands of activities will take place across the U.S. to tell Congress that health coverage for Americans must be a top priority. 

Cover the Uninsured Week is designed to raise awareness that too many Americans are without health insurance—gambling with their lives every day.  This year’s events will include press conferences, business summits, health and enrollment fairs, small business seminars, campus seminars and interfaith activities. The campaign will also work to ensure that people who are uninsured get enrolled if they are eligible for public coverage programs.

Ohio hospitals are encouraged to show their support for Cover the Uninsured Week. To view how one city is becoming involved, check out Cincinnati’s Web site at www.covercincy.org.  Learn more about how to help promote this initiative in your area at www.covertheuninsured.com. (Berna Bell, bernab@ohanet.org)

Tuesday, April 11, 2006
ODH Hosts Provider Association Meeting
The Ohio Department of Health (ODH) last week hosted a quarterly meeting of the associations representing Ohio’s health care providers, including hospitals, hospice and ambulatory surgery centers. The following issues were reported:

• ODH agreed to work with OHA to modernize and improve the maternity licensure program.
• Regarding the Senate Bill 50-mandated regulation of freestanding and hospital services, ODH reported it will for the first time begin surveying open heart surgery, cardiac catheterization, transplant and pediatric intensive care units.  The new survey process will focus initially on outliers in the data that the services have been reporting under the SB50 rules. OHA will seek more information on these outliers and provide information to member hospitals as it is available. Hospitals will receive 30-day advance notice of the survey and surveys will last less than one day. The statute provides for a $1250 inspection fee plus a $650 complaint or follow-up inspection fee, with a cap of $5,000 per year for all surveys of each facility’s SB50 services.
• ODH is revising its tuberculosis regulations to reflect changes recently issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. However, the revisions will take some time because ODH must adhere to statutory rulemaking process.
• Though hospitals are required to provide a certified lactation consultant as part of their obstetric care services, ODH will consider granting waivers to hospitals able to justify that noncertified counselors adequately meet patient needs in this area. (Rick Sites, ricks@ohanet.org)