• 5/04 - Orange County ZOOM Table - Discussion Topic: "Overcoming Healthcare Career Obstacles" - Featured Member Presenter: Dan Forche, President & CEO of Prelude Corporation


• 5/10 - Silicon Valley ZOOM Table - Discussion Topic: "Is the Healthcare Market Still Hot? led by Mike McKinnon, M&A Partner, Sheppard Mullin" - Featured Member Presenter: Lisa Cooper, CEO, Santa Cruz Surgery Center and Principal of Advocare+


• 5/11 - Bay Area (SF) ZOOM Table - Discussion Topic: "So, How Does Kaiser Permanente Set Its Prices Anyway?" - Featured Member Presenter: Marcos Vasconcelos, Executive Director, Strategic Market Planning & Execution at Kaiser Permanente Health Plan


• 5/19 - Bay Area (OAK) ZOOM Table - Discussion Topic: "Dealing with Inflation's Impact on Healthcare"


• 5/20 - Los Angeles ZOOM Table - Discussion Topic: "Is the Healthcare Market Still Hot?" - Featured Guest Member Presenter: Mike McKinnon, M&A Partner in the Corporate Practice Group of Sheppard Mullin


• Explore Membership in ABL's Executive Round Tables >>>

• Angle Health Partners with H1
• Biospectal Chosen by ConnectedLife Health + Vies for Medtech Award
• Change Healthcare Launches InterQual 2022
• Choice in Aging CEO Interviewed in Webcast
• Cigna Honored as Best Employer for Health and Well-being + Teams with Kaiser Permanente
• Elemeno Health Chosen for 2022 KidsX Accelerator Cohort
• FOMAT Medical Research CEO Spotlighted for Entrepreneurship
• HHS Announces $90M to Support New Data-Driven Approaches
• HumanGood Highlights Recent Event
• Kaiser Permanente Finds Medical Assistants Help Facilitate Better Virtual Doc Appointments + KP Medical School Among Nation's Most Diverse
• LifeLong Medical Care CMO Discusses Congress's Push for Additional COVID Relief
• LigoLab Named to Capterra 2022 Shortlist as an "Emerging Favorite"
• Mazzetti Reinforces Commitment to Decarbonization
• MedWand CEO Spotlighted in Magazine Feature + MedWand Performs Live Cross-Country Medical Exam
• Mission Hospice Gala to Celebrate Dean Martin
• Nelson Hardiman Discusses Shifting Mask Mandates; Medical vs Recreational Models for Controlled Substances; & Making Websites More Accessible for the Disabled; + Announces Westwood Village Sublease Opportunities
• Pangea Laboratory Donates 50,000 COVID-19 PCR Tests for the Uninsured
• Parentis Health Acquires Pop-In Care to Expands Services
• Royal Ambulance CEO Joins Call for Increased Medi-Cal Reimbursement to EMS
• Satellite Healthcare's Bernadette Vincent Receives "Women of Impact" Award
• Savi Group Discusses Healthcare Tech & Importance of Reducing Coding Errors
• Select Data Provides On-Demand Coding Updates Webinar
• WestFax Launches New Product, Comprehend
• Wipfli Announces Upcoming Healthcare-Related Webinars

• Eckert & Ziegler Collaborates with Alpha-9 Theranostics & Sirtex Medical
• Profi Hailed by Software Review Platforms
• Tanner Research CEO to Present Virtual Nutrition Science Workshop in May & June

Eckert & Ziegler (EZ) has executed with Alpha-9 Theranostics, a Canadian biotech company, a clinical supply agreement for EZ's medical radioisotope Lutetium-177, which will be used for the clinical development of Alpha-9's investigational drugs.
AND, EZ and Sirtex Medical have extended their long-term supply agreement for the use of yttrium-90 in Sirtex microspheres for the treatment of liver cancer to the Chinese market. The agreement guarantees EZ a significant share of the growing global demand for Y90-based microspheres. (Frank Yeager, ABL-Tech SGV)

Profi has been recognized in the Capterra Shortlist and Software Advice Frontrunner for Training Software, as a top-rated software with an overall rating of 4.8/5.
AND, read This Subscription-based Wellness Consultancy Cut Admin Waste, Tripled Subscriptions and 60Xed Activations With Profi Network to learn about Ikigai Consulting's success story. (Alina Trigubenko, ABL-Tech WLA)

On the evenings of May 4 (click here) and June 2 (click here), John Tanner, Ph.D., of Tanner Research, will present his free Nutrition Science Virtual Workshop, via Zoom, where he will relay to participants the scientific information they need to avoid heart disease and other leading killers with a proper diet. The group will discuss strategies for change and John will field questions, plus give a free book to participants. (John Tanner, Ph.D., ABL-Tech SGV)

Between December 2021 and February 2022, during the Omicron wave in the U.S., the CDC announced the estimated percentage of the U.S. population with infection-induced antibodies increased from 34% to 58% across all age groups, including 75% of children and adolescents. Kristie Clarke, MD, of the CDC's COVID-19 Emergency Response Team noted that they examined data on the proportion of the population who developed antibodies to the nucleocapsid protein, which only appear after infection, not vaccination. (https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/98414)

A mask mandate for commuter rail passengers is back by popular demand in the San Francisco Bay Area, the region that two years ago imposed the nation's first coronavirus stay-at-home order and now is bucking the national trend away from required face coverings. The Bay Area Rapid Transit system (BART), had decided last week to drop its rule in line with a federal court ruling but that decision prompted an outcry from riders, spokeswoman Alicia Trost said. BART's board of directors subsequently decided to temporarily restore the mask rule until at least July 18, the agency said in a statement. A week earlier, Los Angeles County restored its masking rule for all public transportation including buses, trains, subways, taxis, and airports. (https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/california/articles/2022-04-29/masks-again-required-on-san-francisco-bay-area-rapid-transit)

Just hours after it was announced that U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris tested positive for COVID-19, it was also announced that she has been prescribed and has taken Paxlovid, an antiviral pill used to treat the virus. The pills were authorized in December, and now the Biden administration said the number of sites with available pills would be increased from 20,000 to 30,000 for the time being, with intentions of having 40,000 locations with pills "over the coming weeks." (https://thehill.com/news/administration/3467171-harris-prescribed-covid-19-antiviral-pill-after-testing-positive/)
ON MAY 2, it was reported that VP Harris tested negative on Monday for COVID-19, six days after she tested positive for the virus, and has been cleared to return to the White House on Tuesday, May 3. It was also reported that Harris would continue to wear a "well-fitting mask while around others" in accordance with CDC guidelines until through her tenth day after her positive test. (https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/harris-negative-covid-19-taking-antiviral-pill-84448232)

In an April 26 "PBS NewsHour" interview, Dr. Fauci said, "We are certainly right now in this country out of the pandemic phase," pointing to low levels of new infections, hospitalizations and deaths. However, he offered clarification in media interviews a day later. "I probably should have said 'the acute component of the pandemic phase.' And I understand how that can lead to some misinterpretation," Dr. Fauci told NPR's "1A" podcast. "We're really in a transitional phase, from a deceleration of the numbers into hopefully a more controlled phase and endemicity," he told The Washington Post. While the nation's "full-blown pandemic dynamic" was characterized by "900,000 cases a day, tens of thousands of hospitalizations, 3,000 deaths a day," Dr. Fauci told the Post the nation is moving into the "control" phase, where the virus will continue to circulate without causing significant waves of severe illness and death. Still, the nation is not quite there yet, he said. (https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/public-health/fauci-clarifies-us-transitioning-out-of-pandemic-phase.html)

Members of the union representing thousands of striking Stanford nurses voted overwhelmingly to approve a new contract offer, bringing an end to the week-long work stoppage. Stanford and Lucille Packard Children's Hospital had to cancel some elective surgeries and call in replacement workers when 5,000 nurses hit the picket lines last on April 25. The contract will raise nurses' salaries by 17% over three years, boost health and retirement benefits, and add an additional week of vacation time starting in 2024. (https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2022/05/02/stanford-nurses-strike-contract-approved-crona/)

The U.S. labor market will fully recapture all jobs lost during the pandemic by the end of August, Fitch Ratings forecasts in a new report. The United States is only about 1.6 million jobs shy of February 2020 levels, making the forecast feasible. Thirteen states, including Florida, Georgia, Colorado, and Arizona, have already fully recovered all jobs lost during COVID-19, Fitch said. (https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/workforce/us-to-recover-jobs-lost-amid-covid-19-by-summer-fitch-forecasts.html)

Walgreens Boots Alliance recently said that it will expand the number of stores in the San Francisco and Los Angeles areas with so-called Health Corners, which offer medical care in association with health insurer Blue Shield of California. It has opened 12 Health Corner locations in California and plans to open eight more by mid-year. Health Corners are discrete spaces in stores where a registered nurse or pharmacist can screen a patient for high blood pressure or diabetes, help set up a high-tech medical device, or schedule a mammogram. Blue Shield reimburses billable services that the health advisor provides to its members. For customers who are Blue Shield members there's a longer list of available health services and no copay, while customers who aren't covered by the insurer can also get select services from a Health Corner for a fee, (https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/06/walgreens-expands-its-medical-care-offerings-in-major-california-markets.html)

Hickory Hollow Mall - a full 1.1 million square feet of retail space in southeastern Nashville - was once the largest shopping center in Tennessee. Now the mammoth complex surrounded by acres of parking is on track to join the ranks of malls making a transition into a booming economic sector: medicine. Vanderbilt University Medical Center has had such success reviving a different mall that its health system, Vanderbilt Health, plans to add medical clinics at the mall. What big-city health systems need most is something shopping malls have plenty of: space and parking. They offer convenience for patients and practitioners, as well as costing less than expanding an existing hospital campus. Nationwide, 32 enclosed malls house health care services in at least part of their footprint, according to a database kept by Ellen Dunham-Jones, a Georgia Tech urban design professor. (https://khn.org/news/article/shopping-for-space-health-systems-make-over-malls/)

In a recent Wall Street Journal Opinion piece, Ezekiel J. Emanuel and Billy Deitch write: "As with other parts of the American economy, healthcare has stretched its workforce to its limit. Doctors, nurses, administrators, respiratory therapists, and others have been in emergency mode for much of the past two years. Unpredictable surges of Covid-19 still threaten to increase the workload and sideline workers. No wonder there is tremendous burnout. People are quitting, causing serious workforce shortages, and compromising medical care.

"The solution is automation. For decades this has been a dirty word, viewed as an existential threat to American workers. Covid-19 and burnout, however, are making it a savior. The labor shortage in healthcare has put enormous strain on the industry. Largely because of employee burnout, the healthcare workforce shrank by 424,000 between February 2020 and March 2022, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Healthcare executives complain it is harder to hire and retain employees than ever before. With 9% of job positions in healthcare unfilled, the industry must find ways to ease the burden." Read More: https://www.wsj.com/articles/automation-doctor-job-easier-artificial-inteligence-labor-shortage-digital-health-care-medical-worker-nurse-therapist-cost-healthcare-covid-19-hospital-capacity-11649967481?mod=hp_opin_pos_5#cxrecs_s

Hospitals are making a bet that artificial intelligence can help identify and treat patients at highest risk in their ERs, inpatient wards and ICUs, for dangers including the deadly infection sepsis and an impending cardiac arrest or stroke. AI algorithms are processing vast troves of data in electronic medical records, searching for patterns to predict future outcomes and recommend treatments. They are creating early-warning systems to help hospital staff spot subtle but serious changes in a patient's condition that aren't always visible or noticed in a busy unit, and predicting which patients about to be discharged from the hospital are at the highest risk of being readmitted. These systems are just one effort in a vast array of AI projects in healthcare - from helping detect cancer in radiology images to identifying which drugs to test on patients with different diseases. But this prediction technology holds especially significant promise to transform care and improve patient safety in ER and ICU cases - as long as the systems can be designed to avoid some of the medical, technological and ethical concerns that have emerged in mixing the science of machine learning with the art of medicine. (https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-hospitals-are-using-ai-to-save-lives-11649610000)

Seniors save nearly $2,000 on average a year in total healthcare spending in Medicare Advantage (MA) compared to fee-for-service Medicare, a new study by the advocacy group Better Medicare Alliance finds. Consulting firm ATI Advisory, which performed the study that examined 2019 Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey data, found that the average total spending in 2019 per beneficiary was $3,524 in MA compared with $5,489 for those in traditional Medicare. Researchers added that the study also showed savings across race and ethnicity. (https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/payers/study-medicare-advantage-saves-seniors-nearly-2k-year-compared-fee-service)

Pursuant to Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government, federal agencies, and departments, including HHS, have recently released their plans to advance equity. On April 20, 2022, CMS announced a plan of action towards providing affordable health care for all people, regardless of their background, driving health equity. Read More: https://kslawemail.com/128/9063/pages/art3.asp?sid=a2701ca5-9d13-4f7d-a527-ed8ad1bb9892

CMS issued its annual Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) and Long-Term Care Hospital (LTCH) Prospective Payment System Proposed Rule for FY 2023, on April 18, 2022. In the Proposed Rule, CMS proposes to update the IPPS and LTCH payment rates, modify the payment rules for direct graduate medical education to comply with a recent federal court decision, impose a permanent 5% cap on year-to-year wage index losses, and adopt a new supplemental payment for tribal hospitals and hospitals located in Puerto Rico. This article provides an overview of the key proposals in the Proposed Rule. Comments to the Proposed Rule must be submitted by June 17, 2022. (https://kslawemail.com/128/9063/pages/art1.asp?sid=a2701ca5-9d13-4f7d-a527-ed8ad1bb9892) Meanwhile, CMS also issued a proposed rule seeking to make routine updates to hospice-based payments and to the aggregate cap amount for FY 2023. CMS estimates that hospices will see a 2.7% ($580 million) increase in payments. Comments are due by May 31, 2022. Read More: https://kslawemail.com/128/9015/pages/article-4.asp?sid=17d55d0f-e273-4c98-8e78-7e7639f68dc7

CMS issued its FY 2023 Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) Prospective Payment System (PPS) proposed rule updating Medicare payment policies and rates for SNFs, on April 11, 2022. The proposed rule also includes proposals for the SNF Quality Reporting Program and the SNF Value-Based Program for FY 2023 and future years, and it seeks feedback on addressing staffing constraints and turnover in nursing homes and health equity disparities. Comments are due to CMS by June 10, 2022. The key highlights of the proposed rule are summarized here: https://kslawemail.com/128/9039/pages/article1.asp?sid=daa72c83-170a-4697-b914-3da83bd9b671

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