“Good hospitals make their patients healthier, but socially responsible hospitals make their communities healthier too,” President Dr. Vikas Saini, president of Lown Institute, said in a statement. “These are the hospitals America needs right now — hospitals that can set and achieve ambitious goals for serving their entire community.” More
Presbyterian Santa Fe Medical Center is the most socially responsible hospital in New Mexico and the 16th in the country. That’s according to the Lown Institute, a nonprofit health organization, which released its annual rankings for socially responsible hospitals across the country. The rankings — which grade hospitals on 53 metrics across patient outcomes, value of care, and health equity — include grades for nearly 4,000 hospitals.
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And an April report by the Lown Institute, a health care think tank, said more than 1,350 nonprofit hospitals have “fair share” deficits, meaning the value of their community investments fails to equal the value of their tax breaks.
“With so many Americans struggling with medical debt and access to care, the need for hospitals to give back as much as they take grows stronger every day,” said Vikas Saini, president of the institute.
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60% of U.S. hospitals are nonprofit hospitals. The non-partisan Lown Institute estimates those institutions receive $30 billion in tax breaks each year. The institute recently evaluated nonprofit hospitals for their community benefits. They found that three-quarters received more in tax breaks than the hospitals spent on charity care or other community benefits. More
And an April report by the Lown Institute, a health care think tank, said more than 1,350 nonprofit hospitals have “fair share” deficits, meaning the value of their community investments fails to equal the value of their tax breaks. “With so many Americans struggling with medical debt and access to care, the need for hospitals to give back as much as they take grows stronger every day,” said Vikas Saini, president of the institute.
60% of U.S. hospitals are nonprofit hospitals. The non-partisan Lown Institute estimates those institutions receive $30 billion in tax breaks each year. The institute recently evaluated nonprofit hospitals for their community benefits. They found that three-quarters received more in tax breaks than the hospitals spent on charity care or other community benefits. More
We're now halfway through the year - time for an edition of "Shkreli Awards: Where are they now?" More
How can hospitals prevent and reduce medical debt in their communities? A new report from Los Angeles County reveals the extent of medical debt in the city and recommendations for reducing this burden for residents. More
Which hospitals make the grade this year, and how can we improve hospital social responsibility across the board? Join Lown Institute leaders and health policy experts on July 18th as we reveal America’s most socially responsible hospitals and discuss how to build a system where all hospitals can reach their health equity goals. More
According to Lown research, St. Luke’s University Hospital spent $16,364,000 more on charity care and community investments than the estimated value of its tax exemption. The other five St. Luke’s hospitals’ surpluses totaled nearly $12 million: Upper Bucks Campus ($5,810,000) Miners Campus ($2,994,000)Anderson Campus ($1,589,000) Geisinger St. Luke’s Hospital ($754,000) Monroe Campus ($629,000). More
A recent investigation found that Allina Health System has been rejecting patients with unpaid medical bills. Why is this allowed, and are other hospitals doing it? More
What can we learn about hospital carbon emissions from the EPA's "Energy Star" program? More
However, a health-care think tank, Lown Institute, found that more than three quarters of the 1,773 nonprofit hospitals in the US it examined shortchanged communities by providing less charity care and investments than the value of their tax breaks. Its most recent Fair Share Spending report shows a total “fair share” deficit of $14.2 billion for those hospitals in 2020. More
Should Medicare pay more for the same service delivered in an outpatient facility when it's owned by a hospital? That's the key question behind the push for site-neutral payments, a policy change that federal and state policymakers are considering. More
Hospitals still have a long way to go. A recent analysis by the Lown Institute, a health care think tank, found that more than three-quarters of nonprofit hospitals spent less on charity care and community investment than they reaped in tax breaks. More
What is the hospital community benefit standard and why is it getting so much attention? If you want to get up to date fast on this key health policy issue, we've got you covered... More
An April report from the Lown Institute, a think tank on health-care equity, said nonprofit hospitals are spending less on charity care than they receive in benefits from their tax-exempt status. More
“I think what's interesting to me about Saint Vincent Charity Medical Center is that they do really very well on our measures of clinical outcomes and of value, which is to say avoiding unnecessary treatments and, you know, being cost efficient in what they do,” Dr. Vikas Saini said. More
A detailed recap of our Fair Share launch event, featuring health policymakers and experts from California, Colorado, Pennsylvania, and Oregon. More
"It’s an open secret that not all spending hospitals can claim as community benefits are actually meaningful for community health," the nonprofit's president, Vikas Saini, and policy analyst, Judith Garber, wrote. "The broad definition of community benefit — one of many loopholes in the U.S. tax code — allows hospitals to include spending on items that don’t directly address community health needs. That’s why we focused on the spending that matters most for local communities, some of which are losing tens of millions of dollars in property tax revenue to support nonprofit hospitals." More