While affirming its default rating and $6.6 billion of bonds at "AA+," Fitch Ratings on Sept. 26 lowered the outlook for St. Louis-based Ascension to negative from stable.

Thirty-eight percent of hospital finance leaders said their hospitals are currently automating components of their denials management, and a majority of those who said they aren't are planning to by the end of 2024, according to Akasa, a revenue cycle firm that uses artificial intelligence. 

Federal departments are seeking to raise the administrative fee to enter the No Surprises Act arbitration process from $50 to $150 in 2024. 

West Reading, Pa.-based Tower Health has agreed to sell eight urgent care centers and will close five others, the Philadelphia Business Journal reported Sept. 25.

Tenet Healthcare saw its operating margin for the second quarter come in at 11.9 percent, the same level as Q2 of 2022, when the Dallas-based for-profit giant reported first-half results at the end of July.

St. Margaret's Health CEO Tim Muntz blamed the June closure of St. Margaret’s Health Spring Valley (Ill.) on Spring Valley City Bank, Shaw Local News Network reported Sept. 25.

Texas has earmarked $4.5 million in grant opportunities for four hospitals in the state that converted to the new rural emergency hospital designation earlier this year. 

Marietta, Ga.-based Wellstar Health and Augusta (Ga.) University Health became one effective Aug. 30, and now some of the bonds previously owned by Augusta have been upgraded following the takeover, S&P said Sept. 22.

Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health is keeping to a previously estimated $160 million hit from a major cybersecurity event in late 2022 but it is still unable a year later to fully evaluate the financial burden it will have to bear.

  Accountants are leaving the profession in droves, The Wall Street Journal reported Sept. 22. 

Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health implemented workforce reductions in the fourth quarter of the fiscal year ending June 30, resulting in about 2,000 job cuts. 

Sayre, Pa.-based Guthrie Clinic was downgraded to "A" from "A+" amid "accelerated" and higher-than-expected operating losses in fiscal 2023, Fitch said Sept. 22.

CVS Health has appointed Michael Mahoney, chair and CEO of medical device manufacturer Boston Scientific to its board of directors, effective Nov. 1.

UMass Memorial Health closed the maternity unit at its Leominster, Mass., hospital at midnight Sept. 22 despite months of criticism and protests, The Boston Globe reported.

Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves on Sept. 21 unveiled plans to reform Medicaid that he said will benefit the state's hospitals by almost $700 million.

A government shutdown would leave HHS with about half of its staff, with 42 percent furloughed on the second day of closure.

As Peoria, Ill.-based OSF HealthCare emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic, CFO Michael Allen told Becker's that the task ahead is 'margin repair.'

Healthcare price transparency legislation is missing an important piece of information: who owns the providers, health policy experts wrote in Health Affairs. 

The jobs of senior healthcare leaders are fraught with challenges. That's because the post-pandemic business environment for healthcare organizations is rife with enormous financial and managerial pressures. Addressing those challenges requires strong financial planning agility and openness to modernizing traditional processes. 

Several hospitals either withdrew their membership of the Mississippi Hospital Association earlier this year or communicated their desire to.