Although Mayo Clinic's net operating income through the first nine months of 2020 is down 51.4 percent compared to 2019, the Rochester, Minn.-based system's operating margin was 3.6 percent, according to recently released financial documents.

Nineteen provider groups are urging Congress to lower the threshold requirements for the Quality Payment Program, established under the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015.

Sioux Falls, S.D.-based Sanford Health President and CEO Kelby Krabbenhoft shared his thoughts about having COVID-19 and why he won't be wearing a mask in an email to health system staff, according to the Grand Forks Herald. 

HIV-related deaths decreased by 48.4 percent from 2010 to 2017, CDC data shows.

Laurie Harting, RN, president and CEO of San Francisco-based Dignity Health's Greater Sacramento division, is retiring Jan. 3 as Dignity's parent company changes its operating division structure, CommonSpirit Health said Nov. 19.

The U.S. reported 8,461 COVID-19 deaths for the week ending Nov. 18, the highest weekly COVID-19 death count since May, according to The COVID-19 Tracking Project.  

Texas has the most COVID-19 patients hospitalized in the U.S., according to the COVID Tracking Project. 

Banner Health's revenue increased year over year in the first three quarters of this year, but the Phoenix-based health system ended the period with a loss. 

When the pandemic surged in New York this spring, Northwell Health was hit especially hard, treating more than 41,000 COVID-19 patients between March and May. Annabella Salvador-Kelly, MD, who serves as senior vice president of medical affairs and associate CMO at the New Hyde Park, N.Y.-based health system, had a front row view of this initial surge and has since played a critical role in Northwell Health's pandemic response. 

With both Moderna and Pfizer reporting that their vaccine candidates are close to 95 percent effective, and Pfizer planning to submit an application for emergency authorization for its vaccine in the next few days, health systems across the country are finalizing plans to distribute a COVID-19 vaccine.

Ten hospitals and health systems posted job listings for supply chain expertise in the last week:

Penn Foundation, a behavioral health provider serving 20,000 patients a year, said it's making plans to join the St. Luke's University Health Network in Bethlehem, Pa.

Novant Health and UNC Health are planning a UNC School of Medicine branch campus in Charlotte, N.C., the health systems said Nov. 19.

Alexa Kimball, MD, CEO of Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, oversaw the rapid deployment of telehealth and data analytics during the pandemic. Now her team is focused on refining the digital patient experience and predictive analytics.

Optum Ventures, Optum's venture capital arm, has grown significantly over the past four years, from investing $7.5 million in 2016 to $654 million so far in 2020.

Postponing Thanksgiving travel and celebrating virtually or only with those from the same household is the best way to prevent the spread of COVID-19, the CDC said Nov. 19 as cases continue to soar. 

Although recent protocols have aimed to improve the care standard for severe heart attack patients, people living in minority communities aren't benefiting much as much as those in  non-minority communities, according to a recent study published in JAMA Network Open.

Baptist Health is recruiting 250 patient access coordinators to work in its call centers, the Louisville, Ky.-based health system said Nov. 18. 

HHS Secretary Alex Azar said Nov. 18 that the department is seeing "tremendous uptake" of a program between HHS, CVS and Walgreens to deliver COVID-19 vaccines to long-term care facilities, with 99% of facilities signed up for the program, CNBC reported. 

Health insurers will have to disclose customers' estimated out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs as well as the negotiated prices they pay for drugs under a new rule passed by the Trump administration, Kaiser Health News reported.