Penn Medicine is going all in on proton therapy, a costly treatment that is unproven for most common cancers
"If we're ever going to get to the great health system that Americans deserve, we have to call out bad behavior," Vikas Saini, MD, president of the Lown Institute, said. "The Shkreli Awards are a mirror that's hard to look into, but we've got to do it." More
“If we’re ever going to get to the great health system that Americans deserve, we have to call out bad behavior,” Dr. Vikas Saini, president of the Lown Institute, said in a statement. “The Shkreli Awards are a mirror that’s hard to look into, but we’ve got to do it.” More
Lown Institute president Vikas Saini, MD, told MedPage Today that this year's list reads like "a tragic comedy of grift and profiteering." If the actions of these companies and individuals seem to be worse than in past years, Saini said that's because governmental agencies and media organizations appear to be "more vigilant in calling out bad actors." More
Amid a wave of intensified criticism of hospital CEO pay at large, one source continues to pay close attention to the ratio of executive compensation to worker wages at more than 300 health systems. That source is Lown Institute, a nonpartisan think tank that measures hospitals' and health systems' social responsibility through 53 metrics related to inclusivity, pay equity, community benefit, care value and outcomes. More
Because of its nonprofit status, Ascension avoids more than $1 billion a year in federal, state and local taxes, according to the Lown Institute, a health care think tank. Until the pandemic, Ascension was consistently profitable, earning hundreds of millions a year. More
While hospital systems focus on more lucrative adult care operations, often sacrificing pediatric care in the process, the consequences of such decisions are often ignored, Brenna Miller, a health communications specialist at think tank the Lown Institute, wrote on its site Dec. 5. More
The Lown Institute of Needham has long argued that hospitals perform way too many procedures it has identified as being low-value, meaning they offer little to no clinical benefit to patients and, in many cases, are more likely to harm them than help them. More
The Lown Institute calls for greater transparency and accountability. More
Nine city hospitals have spent millions of dollars less on community investments than they receive in tax breaks, according to a report released this week by the Lown Institute, a nonprofit health care think tank. More
A new report from the Lown Institute—a healthcare think tank—suggests that New York City hospitals have not been holding up their end of the bargain when it comes to local tax breaks and community investment. The study looked at 21 hospitals and found that "nine have a Fair Share deficit—meaning that the value of their community investments fails to equal the value of their federal, state, and local tax breaks." The study found that—in total—the nine hospitals are $727 million short of equaling the $1.2 billion in tax breaks they received in 2019. More
Nine New York hospitals out of a study of 21 are failing to invest in their communities in an amount equal to the tax breaks they receive on a federal, state and local level, the Lown Institute reported Nov. 16. The study only examined data from nonprofit hospitals, including nine that are a total of $727 million short of community investments that equal their combined $1.2 billion in tax breaks in 2019. The report dubbed this a "fair share deficit." More
New York City nonprofit hospitals had a fair share deficit of $727 million in 2019, with nine major facilities spending less on community investments than they received in tax breaks, according to a report from the Lown Institute. In exchange for being exempt from most federal, state, and local taxes, nonprofit hospitals must provide free and discounted care to their communities and invest in community health improvements. More
The Lown Institute Hospitals Index calculated “fair share spending” for more than 1,800 hospitals across 275 nonprofit hospital systems by comparing each system’s spending on charity care and community investment to the value of its tax exemption. More