Becker's Hospital Review

79 FINANCE CMO / CARE DELIVERY Oncologists sue Maryland hospital over lost privileges after plan to switch physician groups By Kelly Gooch N ine cancer physicians at Anne Arun- del Medical Center in Annapolis, Md., sued the hospital alleging it fired them and refused to renew their priv- ileges at the facility, the Capital Gazette reported Feb. 18. e oncologists, who filed the lawsuit in Jan- uary, were employed at Anne Arundel Physi- cian Group, which is owned by the hospital's parent company, Luminis Health. On April 6, 2020, they presented a propos- al to hospital leaders to leave Anne Arundel Medical Center to join Maryland Hematolo- gy Oncology, the state's largest independent medical oncology and hematology group. ey said they saw the move as a way to es- cape "inadequate support of its cancer pro- gram," and alleviate financial concerns amid the COVID-19 pandemic, while still keeping hospital privileges that allow them to perform medical services at Anne Arundel Medical Center, according to the Capital Gazette. Aer presenting their proposal to the hospi- tal, the oncologists said they received a letter on April 23, saying their employment at Anne Arundel Physician Group was terminated, and that managers refused to renew their hospital privileges because they viewed the physicians as competition. According to the lawsuit, the proposal to join Maryland Hematology Oncology was viewed as a resignation by the hospital. e hospital contends the physicians were no longer eligible for privileges because the hospital entered an exclusive contract for oncology services with seven new oncologists. Tim Adelman, general counsel/chief legal counsel for Luminis Health, told Becker's Hospital Review: "We are pleased with the ex- pertise of our seven new oncologists, as well as the continuity of care we have ensured for our patients as part of our nonprofit mission. is dispute started aer nine oncologists resigned their employment to join a for-profit organi- zation. ey were not terminated and rejected our repeated efforts to retain them." n Physicians see spike in rare inflammatory condition linked to COVID-19 By Mackenzie Bean P hysicians are reporting a significant uptick in cases of multisys- tem inflammatory syndrome in children, a rare inflammatory condition potentially linked to COVID-19, The New York Times reported Feb. 16. The condition, known as MIS-C, typically emerges several weeks after COVID-19 infection and causes symptoms like fever, inflammation and poor organ function. Physicians said these cases are not just becoming more common, but also more severe. "We're now getting more of these MIS-C kids, but this time, it just seems that a higher percentage of them are really critically ill," Roberta DeBi- asi, MD, chief of infectious diseases at Children's National Hospital in Washington, D.C., told the Times. About 80 percent to 90 percent of Children's National patients with MIS-C need intensive care, up from about half of patients in the spring of 2020, according to Dr. DeBiasi. Children's Hospital & Medical Center in Omaha, Neb., saw about two MIS-C cases per month between April and October 2020, with about 30 percent of patients needing intensive care. This jumped to 10 cases in December and another 12 in January, with about 60 percent needing ICU care. It's unclear why cases are rising, and experts say it's too early to spec- ulate whether virus variants are influencing these numbers. Overall, MIS-C is still a rare condition. As of Feb. 8, the CDC had confirmed 2,060 cases nationwide, including 30 deaths. n 31% of nurses cite burnout as reason for leaving job By Mackenzie Bean N early one-third of nurses reported leav- ing their jobs because of burnout in 2018, according to a study published Feb. 4 in JAMA Network Open. Researchers analyzed survey data of more than 3.9 million registered nurses in the U.S. collected between April 30 and Oct. 12, 2018. In total, 418,769 nurses reported leaving their jobs in the last year, and 31.5 percent identified burnout as a reason for their de- parture. Among nurses who said they consid- ered leaving, 43.4 percent cited burnout as a contributing factor. Other factors that contributed to nurses leaving their roles included: a stressful work environment (34.4 percent); inadequate staff- ing (30 percent); poor management (33.9 percent); and opportunities for better pay (26.5 percent). Nurses who worked in a hospital were 80 per- cent more likely to cite burnout as a reason for ever considering leaving their jobs, com- pared to nurses working in a clinic. n

• Cover