Quality and Safety

During the first eight months of this year, fewer than 18 percent of Medicare patients ended up back in the hospital within a month of discharge, the lowest rate in years, the federal government reported Friday.

Northern Michigan's Munson Healthcare and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan are venturing into the developing world of new payment models by launching a value-based hospital reimbursement agreement.

LifePoint Hospitals, headquartered in Brentwood, Tenn., acquires the struggling Bell Hospital and forms a joint venture with Portage Health.

In theory, if an investment has high societal value, there should be a way to reward the investor and still leave society better off. Investments that improve health tend to produce significant potential cost offsets.

All healthcare providers worry about attracting and retaining good employees. Fred Morgeson, a professor of management, offers healthcare employers five tips for successful hiring and employee retention.

Consumers are not alone in finding retail clinics an attractive option. Increasingly, hospitals are adding them to their array of services.

A new study suggests educating doctors via real-time price comparison is a potentially effective tool in the effort to control costs.

Concentrated economic power, combined with fee-for-service incentives, has made healthcare "the least consumer-friendly" U.S. industry and enabled arbitrary and capricious price gouging, according to the man behind Time magazine's "Bitter Pill" feature.

The lure of rewards points is strong, as credit card companies will tell you. Use your credit card and points build up to be redeemed for gift cards, reductions on gasoline, even cash. One New Jersey hospital is using a rewards points program in the hopes of more effectively managing chronic disease patients.

New research suggests that healthcare organizations can lower their readmission rates and improve patient care simply by using oral nutritional supplements as part of an overall patient care protocol.