MHA's Update Newsletter - Time to Connect

TRANSFORMING HEALTH CARE ADVOCACY
EVENTS CONNECT RESOURCES

March 2, 2018

Time to Connect

Challenging times like these are enhanced by personal connections, and as always, MHA is here to facilitate that connection. Our annual membership meeting in June provides an excellent opportunity to gain insight and understanding into how your organization can plan for the future amid a whirlwind of change. The event begins the evening of June 11 at the Four Seasons in Baltimore with a reception that offers time to connect with one another, as well as with MHA's new President & CEO, Bob Atlas. On Tuesday, June 12, the program will feature prominent speakers, including Dr. Atul Gawande.

Gawande, who has been named one of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential Thinkers, is a renowned surgeon and researcher, and the author of Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End . He'll share his bold visions for improving performance by focusing on the needs of real people, the values that make for a healthy society, the science and technologies waiting over the horizon, and how to reform systems to make it all work. Gawande will also be available for a book-signing and to chat with attendees.

The time we spend together each year at our annual meeting is invaluable. Beyond the information and insight from speakers like Gawande, it's one of the times when we can truly connect to freely share ideas about the future of health care in Maryland.

Registration is now open. Click here to get started.

IN THIS ISSUE...

At Work in Annapolis

MHA Comments on Readmissions Program

Academy on Global Budgeting Scheduled

MHAOnline.org

Calendar of Events

MHA and Member Hospitals on Social Media

MHEI PROGRAMS AND WEBINARS

March 6

Management Boot Camp (Recruitment & Employment)

At Work in Annapolis

This week, MHA testified in support of the Budget Reconciliation and Financing Act and Medicaid budget, which include a $25 million sick tax reduction, our top priority for this session. MHA also testified in support of a bill that would create a grant program to fund behavioral health crisis response programs; we opposed a bill that would require hospitals to report the value of their tax exemptions for public display on the state comptroller's website. The Senate will begin making final budget decisions next week, and your MHA team will continue to engage with legislators and the administration on priority issues and defend against measures that impede your ability to provide care. Throughout the legislative session, you can track MHA's activities via our dashboard , which provides an overview of the previous week and a look at important hearings and events for the following week.

MHA Comments on Readmissions Program

A comment letter on behalf of Maryland's hospitals was sent this week to the Health Services Cost Review Commission, agreeing with commission staff's recommendation to leave unchanged many features of the Readmissions Reduction Incentive Program for Rate Year 2020. The letter states that the current version of the program is constructed to provide additional incentives to meet the requirements of the final year of the All-Payer Model.

Contact: Traci La Valle

Academy on Global Budgeting Scheduled

A State Policy Academy on Global Budgeting for Rural Hospitals will take place May 30 in Baltimore, where MHA Senior Vice President Mike Robbins will participate as a panelist. The Policy Academy will include presentations from federal and state officials, discussion with CEOs of rural hospitals on global budgets, and individual state meetings with experts and staff from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. The State Policy Academy will be hosted by Johns Hopkins University, in collaboration with the Milbank Memorial Fund, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's State Health and Value Strategies, and the National Rural Health Association. Click here to apply to attend.

How Can Too Busy & Overwhelmed be Productive?

A few years ago, one of Maryland's hospital CEOs shared with us a conundrum he was facing. He said, "I'm asking my managers (and staff) to do twice as much, twice as effectively, with no more resources and for no more pay. How do I keep them motivated and on task?"

Prime's Value to Member Hospitals

Prime is the shared service/group purchasing subsidiary of the Maryland Hospital Association. Its goal is to help our member hospitals reduce the cost of care.

Study: 340B Tax-Exempt Hospitals Provide $51.7 Billion In Community Benefits

Tax-exempt hospitals in the 340B drug savings program provided $51.7 billion in total benefits to their communities in 2015, the most recent year for which data is available, according to an analysis released yesterday by the AHA.