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Health Care Updates
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Business New Haven
11/16/1998
By: BNH
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Local Researchers Receive Funds From New Grant Program
WEST HARTFORD - The Patrick & Catherine Weldon Donaghue Medical Research Foundation has announced its first grant awards in the Donaghue Investigator Program for Health-Related Research. This new program will provide grants of $100,000 annually for five years to promising medical researchers who have demonstrated “exceptional potential” for an independent research career and for leadership in their fields of research. The first six Donaghue grant recipients were chosen from 73 applications and include researchers from Yale University, the Yale School of Medicine and Wesleyan University.
Stephen Devoto, Ph.D, assistant professor of biology at Wesleyan university will study muscle-cell development in zebra fish and how specific types of muscle fibers are formed. Mark B. Gerstein, Ph.D, assistant professor of molecular biophysics and biochemistry at Yale University, is researching a large-scale analysis of gene sequences and protein structures. Sharon K. Inouye, Ph.D, assistant professor of medicine at the Yale School of Medicine, will conduct a study at Yale-New Haven Hospital on reducing delirium and functional decline in hospitalized older persons. Zeev Kain, M.D., associate professor of anesthesiology and pediatrics at the Yale School of Medicine, will identify children who are prone to pre-operative anxiety and find ways to decrease their stress to improve outcomes. David Rimm, M.D., Ph.D, assistant professor of pathology at the Yale School of Medicine, will study adhesion protein expression as a predictor of cancer metastasis. Stephen Strittmatter, M.D., Ph.D, associate professor of neurology at the Yale School of Medicine, will investigate axonal regeneration following spinal-cord injury.
Lung Association
Has Fundraising Offers
EAST HARTFORD - The American Lung Association has created three ways you or your company can help others this holiday season. The Golf Privilege Card, available for $30, can be used for a round of golf at more than 30 of Connecticut's courses and driving ranges. For ski enthusiasts there is the 1999 Ski Privilege Book for $39. The book provides discounts at more than a dozen ski resorts in Western Massachusetts and Connecticut. And for those looking for year-end tax savings, the lung association asks that you consider donating an automobile instead of selling it. The deadline for an April 1999 deduction is December 30. For more information, call 800-Lung USA
MedSpan Expands Medicare Network
HARTFORD - MedSpan Inc. has announced that St. Mary's Hospital in Waterbury has joined its Medicare HMO network. St. Mary's is already part of MedSpan's other HMO, POS and PPO health plans.
Optimum Buys Bridgeport Home Health-Care Co.
BOSTON - Optimum Home Health, a member of the Frontier Group's optimum care network, recently acquired A Action Home Health Care and Action Nursing Care, a Bridgeport-based home health-care staffing company. The acquired company has combined annual revenues of approximately $6.5 million. A Action currently provides service to approximately 225 active patients. Optimum Home Health and Optimum Staffing Works currently employ more than 1,000 licensed health-care professionals in Connecticut. Andrea I. Lanpert, senior vice president of Optimum, will oversee the integration of the new company.
Yale Gets $4.3 Million From Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
NEW HAVEN - Yale University has received a five-year $4.3 million grant to pursue advanced research in public health and health care. The grant will support Yale's participation in the Foundation Scholars in Health Policy Research program. Yale has received five grants from the Princeton, N.J.-based philanthropy since the program was established in 1992. Said Theodore Marmor, professor of political science at the Yale School of Management and program director, “It's an extraordinary financial investment in pursuit of these goals.”
Orthopaedic Group Merge, Add Neurosurgeons
GREENWICH - Two of the largest orthopaedic practices in Connecticut recently announced their merger. The new practice, Orthopaedic & Neurological Surgery Specialists, is located at Six Greenwich Office Park. The groups were formerly known as Greenwich Orthopaedic Associates and Orthopaedic Associates. In addition, two neurosurgeons will join the practice. Said President John Crowe of the additions, “Orthopaedic surgeons and neurosurgeons have always cared for patients with back problems, yet it's incredibly rare to find these specialists working together.”
More HMO Clients;
More HMO Losses
WALLINGFORD - According to a report cited by the Connecticut Hospital Association, mid-Atlantic health maintenance organizations saw enrollment rise but net income drop between 1996 and 1997. According to the report, jointly published by the hospital/health-care associations of Connecticut, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania, HMO enrollment rose in each of the four states in 1997 by between three and six percent. The biggest growth came in Medicare managed care, which was up an average of 38 percent across the four states. Inpatient and outpatient utilization also increase markedly in 1997. The result? HMOs incurred net income losses in all four states compared to 1996, when only Pennsylvania HMOs reported negative net income.
Connecticut enrollment in HMOs more than doubled between 1993 and 1997 from 775,732 to 1,579,543, increasing HMO penetration from 24 percent to 48 percent of the population. In 1997 HMO enrollment increased by 169,728, or 12 percent above 1996 levels. Medicare risk-based managed-care enrollment exhibited the greatest growth, nearly tripling from 24,000 to 66,000 between 1996 and 1997. However, as reported in the October 19 Business New Haven, two-thirds of all Connecticut HMOs posted losses for the second quarter of calendar 1998.
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