Economy saps hospital's earnings as patients avoid treatment

Reuters: The slow economy is infiltrating the hospital sector, too. "As the economic downturn drags on and the unemployment rate remains stubbornly high, patients who have lost private insurance coverage or watched their co-payments and deductibles spike up are simply not getting medical care at the rate they once did." Especially hard-hit treatment areas include elective orthopedic procedures such as joint replacements and spinal fusion. Makers of devices for such procedures are also suffering, as are hospital chains. Tenet Healthcare's chief executive said Tuesday: "As we are deep into the recession, it's clear that patients who have a significant personal financial responsibility are behaving very differently than patients who don't" (Kelly, 11/2).

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This article was reprinted from kaiserhealthnews.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.