A new analysis revealed that Medicare spent roughly $2 billion over three years on unnecessary back surgeries for older adults. This alarming figure comes from research conducted by the nonpartisan Lown Institute think tank.
The study examined common procedures including spinal fusion, laminectomy, and vertebroplasty, finding that an unnecessary back surgery is performed on a Medicare beneficiary every eight minutes. More than 200,000 procedures were identified as potentially unnecessary during the study period.
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Over 200,000 back surgeries were performed unnecessarily in the United States over the course of three years, according to a new Lown Institute report. In sum, these low-value back procedures cost Medicare about $2 billion after three years, roughly $600 million annually.
“We trust that our doctors make decisions based on the best available evidence, but that’s not always the case,” Vikas Saini, MD, president of the Lown Institute, said in an organizational release. “In spinal surgery, as with other fields of medicine, physicians routinely overlook evidence to make exceptions, sometimes at shockingly high rates. This type of waste in Medicare is costly, both in terms of spending, and in risk to patients.”
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Hospitals performed more than 200,000 unnecessary back surgeries on Medicare beneficiaries in the U.S. over three years, according to a new analysis.
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In the last three years, U.S. hospitals performed more than 200,000 unnecessary back surgeries on Medicare beneficiaries, according to a Nov. 14 report by the Lown Institute Hospital Index.
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Every eight minutes an unnecessary back surgery is performed, costing Medicare $2 billion over the three years studied.
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Which Medicare Advantage plans do a good job at avoiding overuse for their beneficiaries... and which don't?
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Safety net hospitals across the country are facing downgraded services and closures. Meanwhile, more profitable hospitals within the same systems are expanding and growing bigger than ever. Where is this pattern showing up, and how does it impact patients?
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A new rule from the US Food and Drug Administration just went into effect last month, requiring that mammography providers notify patients about their breast density along with their mammogram results. How does this affect patients?
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Register now for the webinar "Unnecessary Back Surgery: Older Americans put at risk while Billions in Medicare funds wasted" on November 14, 2024.
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Our key takeaways from the recent conference on hospital tax exemptions and community benefit spending, cohosted by the Lown Institute and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
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Are Black mothers more likely to have unscheduled C-sections? A new working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research suggests yes–and that their likelihood of an unscheduled C-section was greater when there were operating rooms going unused. Same hospital, different c-section rates While C-sections can be a lifesaving option when necessary, they are invasive […]
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A new medical debt relief effort in North Carolina focuses on the impact of changes to financial assistance rather than solely forgiving old medical debt. Here's how they did it..
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Nonprofit hospitals are under scrutiny for paying executives millions while cutting jobs and reducing community investment. We examined the top ten highest-paid CEOs from 2021, according to the Lown Hospitals Index, to find out more.
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Following interest from policymakers on hospital community benefit spending, the IRS announced it will audit 35 hospitals with a focus on community benefit compliance. Here's what you need to know
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Hospitals in the U.S. are continuing to land in hot water for excessive spending on CEO pay and other extravagances at the same time as they face financial challenges and lay off hundreds.
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Could AI and other machine learning help ameliorate our nation’s medical debt crisis—or will it make the problem worse? It all depends on how hospitals use these tools, write Kelsey Chalmers, PhD, our own Director of Research, Data Science at the Lown Institute, and Christopher W. Goodman, MD, Clinical Assistant Professor of Internal Medicine at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine, in a recent JAMA Internal Medicine viewpoint.
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A new study estimates that the five most common cancer screenings cost $43 billion in 2021. How exactly was this money spent and where might it have gone instead?
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UnitedHealth Group, the nation’s largest health care company, is under fire for allegedly encouraging clinicians to overdiagnose peripheral artery disease in their Medicare Advantage patients to inflate profits. What does Lown data have to say about this situation?
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While Harris and Walz have challenged corporate power, politicians do so only because voters are pushing for it, cautioned Vikas Saini, president of the Lown Institute, a health-care think tank.
“The health-care corporations now are mega-regional players. They have huge clout. It would really take much more than a single politician,” Saini said. “It’s going to take a broader movement in the country. … Maybe we’ll get there as there is a lot of pain.”
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340B is more than a big pile of money. The program is a band-aid covering up huge problems with our health system that can no longer be ignored. The 340B drug discount program is a hugely important policy issue for hospitals and drug companies, but the most of the rest of us have never heard of it or barely understand it. Why is pharma and the hospital industry getting so worked up about 340B, and how does any of this matter? Here’s what you need to know about a growing policy battle…
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