Oregon hospital settles over uninsured patients

A hospital in Oregon settled its class action lawsuit last week:

PORTLAND, Ore. - A settlement was reached Tuesday in a closely watched class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of uninsured patients who claim a major nonprofit hospital system overcharged them.

The complaint alleges that Providence Hospital System contradicted its stated mission of providing universal access to health care by charging uninsured patients higher rates for the same services than other patients.

The agreement, if approved by the court, will affect tens of thousands of low-income Oregonians, attorneys say. “This is a historic agreement and it will stick,” said Brian Campf, an attorney representing uninsured patients.

Similar lawsuits have been filed against hundreds of hospitals in at least 27 states, alleging that tax-exempt nonprofit hospitals charge higher prices to uninsured patients than insured patients.

The settlement covers medical charges to uninsured patients at seven Providence hospitals in Oregon over a six-year period, going back four years and the next two years. All charges will be recalculated.

Here’s more:

The lawsuit is part of a national campaign headed by Richard Scruggs, a Mississippi attorney who helped win multibillion-dollar settlements with the tobacco industry in the 1990s to pay states for smoking-related health care costs.

“Other hospitals around the country should take a hard look at this” settlement, said Sid Backstrom, spokesman for the Scruggs law firm.

Suit against Maryland over Medicaid

A new class action is aiming to cut the costs of long-term care for Maryland residents on Medicaid:

The state of Maryland has been systematically denying hundreds or thousands of senior citizens Medicaid benefits to which they are entitled under federal law, according to a class action suit filed in Baltimore City Circuit Court.

The complaint alleges that Medicaid-eligible seniors in Maryland are being denied a federally mandated deduction for pre-eligibility medical expenses, including outstanding debts for nursing home care, when the state calculates their income and the contribution they must make toward their own care.

More specifically:

The plaintiffs want the court to order the state to recalculate the expenses of every senior who was previously denied such deductions.

They also seek to void a 2004 rule change, under which the state will allow a deduction for three months’ worth of pre-eligibility debts, provided they were incurred after Apr. 1, 2004.

Proposed settlement for Mississippi Medicaid suit

DeSoto Times Today writer Robert Lee Long commented recently on a proposed class action settlement involving nursing home residents in Mississippi:

For some time, Mississippi lawmakers have sought to [allow] nursing home residents on Medicaid a chance to receive care at home by providing housing and utility deposits. They hope the practice will reduce Medicaid costs by freeing up Medicaid beds.

The proposed settlement pending in federal court would also save taxpayers an estimated $15 million in Medicaid payments to nursing homes.

The 2002 class-action lawsuit against Medicaid and the Department of Rehabilitation Services is pending before U.S. District Judge Henry Wingate.

Several disabled patients sued the agencies after they could not obtain special waivers to allow them to receive medical care at home. In the lawsuit, they alleged discrimination because they were segregated into nursing homes and not allowed to live on their own.

Under the plan, thousands of nursing home residents could have a higher quality of life (living at home) and millions of taxpayer dollars could be put to better use in Mississippi. Sounds pretty promising…

Suit involving vets’ retirement homes

I was reading in The Sun Herald that the director of a veterans’ home, (the Armed Forces Retirement Home in Gulfport, Mississippi), is retiring amid controversy. Apparently there were a multitude of complaints filed against him while he worked there.

But the part of the article that most interested me was this:

In addition, 14 veterans in a Washington, D.C., home filed a class-action law suit Tuesday against the director of the home, Tim Cox, who also oversees the officers in charge at the Gulfport facility, and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The suit alleges the new administration’s budget cuts caused them to not be able to receive adequate treatment. They said the budget cuts are a violation of a federal law that requires the homes to meet a minimum standard for health care, a Washington Post report said.

I couldn’t find any more info on the suit or on Tim Cox, but I’ll keep my eyes peeled…