Shares of WellPoint Inc. fell 4.7 percent this morning after the Indianapolis health insurer announced strong fourth-quarter financial performance but also said it failed to attract as many new customers as it expected. The stock was trading near $75 after closing yesterday at $78.75. The Indianapolis-based health insurer added 708,000 customers in 2007, missing its […]
Joy’s House on Broad Ripple Avenue provides day care services for 23 people. Often at or near capacity, the not-for-profit is raising funds to build a $1.6 million addition that will quadruple its current size. The cramped quarters, where activities include shooting balls in pint-size basketball hoops, underscores the need for extra space. And the participants are not children; they’re adults-the parents of baby boomers who’ve been thrust into the role of care giver. Adult day care centers steadily are…
At an aging building at 863 Massachusetts Ave., they pass through a metal detector and wait in line to show a clerk their
identification and copies of overdue bills. Center Township Trustee Carl Drummer sometimes helps. The Trustee’s Office received
an average of $6.9 million each of the last seven years, mostly from taxes, to provide poor relief-now known as township assistance.
But only about $2 million reached the penniless each year, with much of the difference covering administrative overhead….
Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield and Clarian Health have formed a partnership to serve Indiana’s Medicaid recipients. The new agreement means Medicaid participants can go to one of Clarian’s five hospitals in the Indianapolis area, as well as LaPorte Hospital and Bedford Regional Medical Center. Anthem oversees health benefits for 123,000 Medicaid patients in […]
EDS plans to hire more than 100 workers at a new location in Purdue Research Park in West Lafayette, according to sources familiar with an announcement scheduled this afternoon. The exact number of jobs was not available. The Plano, Texas-based computer services firm would not comment. EDS will hire business analysts, systems and software developers […]
The 200-plus workers EDS plans to add at Purdue Research Park will be housed in 45,000 square feet of a new, 78,000-square-foot office building. Called Innovation Center, the building will open in early 2009, the university said as part of this afternoon’s announcement. Many of the new positions will be software engineers and business analysts. […]
The “father of health savings accounts” isn’t satisfied. At 80, J. Patrick Rooney is gearing up for another health care reform
battle in Washington–five years after winning a colossal victory when Congress awarded health savings accounts tax-free status.
Anthem Insurance Co. added nearly 75,000 commercial customers last year, pushing its total up more than 4 percent. Anthem,
a subsidiary of Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc., now claims a whopping 1.8 million commercial customers in the state. The
trouble is, Anthem’s dominance limits price competition, according to benefits brokers, making it hard for local HMOs such
as M-Plan or even some national players to compete.
New patient satisfaction scores compiled by the federal government and posted online give consumers more feedback than ever regarding the care hospitals provide. The usefulness of that information is up for debate. On its Hospital Compare Web site, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services tracks technical measures that show how often hospitals provide certain types of care that is recommended for patients treated for various conditions-heart attacks or pneumonia, for instance. Starting late last month, the agency began including…
WellPoint Inc. hired Kevin R. Hayden as president of its Medicaid business division, the company announced today. Hayden will begin the job April 21. The Indianapolis-based health insurer has contracts with Medicaid programs in 14 states, including Indiana, serving 2 million customers. WellPoint has more than 35 million customers nationwide. Before joining WellPoint, Hayden was […]
Indianapolis-based Arcadia Resources Inc. has acquired a small in-home health care company in North Carolina for an undisclosed price. Carolina Care generated $2.1 million in revenue last year serving Medicaid patients from three locations. Both companies have home health care offices in Winston-Salem, N.C., which Arcadia plans to merge to save money. “Expanding our in-home […]
WellPoint Inc. has won a contract to administer the Medicare program in New York and Connecticut, a deal worth up to $323 million over five years, the company announced today. The Indianapolis-based health insurer will perform key Medicare administrative functions, for its contracts with hospitals, nurses and physicians, including appeals, reimbursement, claims processing, medical review […]
The federal government has rebuffed an attempt by Ball Memorial Hospital in Muncie to pay higher reimbursements for the Medicaid and Medicare patients it serves. Ball Memorial, which lost $7 million on the patients last year, is reimbursed 86 cents for every dollar of the costs. Many other hospitals in the state receive 96 cents, […]
At Indianapolis-based Adult and Child Mental Health Center Inc., Executive Director Bob Dunbar has developed a contingency plan as he works on the agency’s $25 million budget for next year. He has two versions of a spending plan for the center, which provides mental health services for 4,200 children and adults a year. One includes moderate cuts tied to state funding changes, and the other deals with massive cuts pushed by the federal government. In the worst-case scenario, as much…
Steve Smith has shaken up the Indiana Health
Care Association so much, the group representing Indiana’s for-profit nursing homes is hardly recognizable to those who knew
it before. And the way Smith tells it, he’s just getting started.
Wall Street rejoiced today after WellPoint Inc. posted second-quarter profit that exceeded analysts’ estimates. Investors bid up shares of the Indianapolis-based health insurer as much as 9 percent. As of late this morning, the stock traded at $52.06, up 6.8 percent. WellPoint stock rose along with broader markets, which surged as the price of crude […]
Doc pay-for-performance program set to launch Quality Health First signs up Anthem, 700 doctors After four years of development, a payfor-performance plan for Indianapolisarea doctors will officially launch Oct. 1. Quality Health First, the latest service of the Indiana Health Information Exchange, now has 700 primary-care doctors signed up to receive its reports on the quality of the care they give. And perhaps even more important, the program has contracted with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Indiana as…
After four years of development, a payfor-performance plan for Indianapolisarea doctors will officially launch Oct. 1. Quality Health First, the latest service of the Indiana Health Information Exchange, now has 700 primary-care doctors signed up to receive its reports on the quality of the care they give. And perhaps even more important, the program has contracted with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Indiana as the first health insurer to offer bonus payments to doctors based on how well…
Lilly Endowment Inc. is still on its journey to sell off $2 billion of its Eli Lilly and Co. shares. But after a slow start and a few stops for rest, it may take a little longer to get there than originally thought. The endowment, the single largest holder of Lilly stock, announced its plan to diversify its holdings back in July 2006. For nearly 70 years, the not-for-profit held its wealth almost exclusively in the pharmaceutical company’s stock. So…
Thomas Healthcare Consulting, an Indianapolis firm that helps long-term care facilities with reimbursements from Medicare and Medicaid as well as other issues, has been acquired by BKD LLP. BKD is an accounting and consulting firm headquartered in Springfield, Mo. Financial terms were not disclosed. Robert Thomas, who founded Thomas Healthcare in 1989, is joining BKD […]
