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8 CFO / FINANCE Chicago hospital halts some services, cuts more than half its beds By Ayla Ellison H oly Cross Hospital in Chicago is scal- ing back services and reducing its bed count amid financial challenges, ac- cording to the Chicago Tribune. e nonprofit hospital, which has been losing roughly $2 million a month since July, will go from 264 licensed beds to fewer than 110. It will also cut certain services, including the temporary suspension of OB/GYN care on Nov. 1, according to the report. "All hospitals are looking at how to trans- form care delivery and responsibly allocate resources to address changing patient needs," Karen Teitelbaum, president and CEO of Chi- cago-based Sinai Health System, which oper- ates Holy Cross Hospital, said in a release. "At Holy Cross Hospital, we have seen fewer births, as well as changes in demand for criti- cal care and telemetry beds, so we are making changes in our programs and services to ad- dress those needs." Officials said several factors are contributing to the hospital's financial challenges, includ- ing lower reimbursement rates from gov- ernment payers and patient volume shiing from inpatient to outpatient care, according to the Chicago Tribune. "We really are making sure that whatever changes we make, we're ensuring we have ample beds of the right kind to continue to serve the community," Ms. Teitelbaum told the Chicago Tribune. e hospital will cut 70 medical/surgical beds and consolidate two critical care units with a total of 20 beds into a single 10-bed unit. Some positions may be affected by the chang- es, but officials don't expect a "large layoff " of employees, Sinai Health System Executive Vice President and COO Airica Steed told the Chicago Tribune. n UnitedHealth, Optum offer care + coverage under new package By Morgan Haefner U nitedHealth Group and its health services subsidiary Optum are undertaking a new ef- fort to combine health insurance and medi- cal care, according to Forbes. UnitedHealth and Optum launched the pack- age, called the SignatureValue Harmony Net- work, Jan. 1, 2019. The accountable care platform serves 1.5 million people in five Southern Cali- fornia counties, Optum CEO Andrew Witty said, according to Forbes. "With our geographic presence and integrated open system of care, we recently co-created with UnitedHealthcare a distinctive product called Har- mony that provides a seamless experience by unit- ing care and coverage, achieving 20 percent sav- ings for people as compared to UnitedHealthcare's comparable coverage offerings," Mr. Witty said during UnitedHealth's third-quarter earnings call. SignatureValue Harmony's physician network in- cludes providers from UnitedHealth's OptumCare, in addition to providers from El Segunda, Ca- lif.-based HealthCare Partners; Sharp HealthCare in San Diego; and UC San Diego Health. n VCU Health says it will stop suing patients over unpaid bills By Kelly Gooch R ichmond-based Virginia Commonwealth University Health System said it will stop filing lawsuits against pa- tients to collect debt and make it easier for patients to re- ceive financial assistance, according to Kaiser Health News. The move comes after a KHN examination of district court data revealed that the health system's in-house physicians group filed more than 56,000 patient debt-collection lawsuits for $81 million over seven years, ending in 2018. Melinda Hancock, VCU Health's chief administrative and finan- cial officer, told KHN the health system now has a new approach, which includes ending such litigation against patients "as part of normal debt collection." She said VCU Health is also boosting financial assistance for low- er-income families and stopping garnishment of patient wages and placing liens on patient homes to collect debt. Health system spokesperson Laura Rossacher told the nonprofit news service VCU Health is looking at "how we should address pending lawsuits and retrospective cases." Another Virginia health system, Charlottesville-based Univer- sity of Virginia Health System, also announced changes to its collection practices, after a special report for The Washington Post revealed it had sued thousands of former patients, seized wages and put liens on homes. Ms. Hancock told KHN that VCU Health already had been considering policy changes when the special report came out, and its revelations hastened the health system's decision. n