Harvard Hospitals Join Group

In an attempt to compete with lower-cost organizations for heart patients, Harvard's combined Massachusetts General(MGH) and Brigham and Women's hospitals are joining a national coalition o teaching hospitals according to media reports this week.

Other major hospitals included in the University Cardiovascular Care Consortium include the Mayo Clinic, the Stanford University Medical Center and the Texas Heart Institute in Houston, according to reports in the Boston Globe.

The group was supposed to meet this week in Boston, the Globe said Tuesday.

Michelle Marcello, an MGH spokesperson, yesterday refused to confirm the reports that a group had already formed, but did not deny that talks were in progress.

Discussions are ongoing at this time," Marcello said. "We may have more nextweek,"

The Consortium seems to have been born out ofthe same factors that spurred MGH and Brigham andWomen's, two of Harvard's traditionally fiercelyindependent teaching hospitals, to announce thiswinter that they were joining forces--thepressures of rising health care costs andcompetition from community-based hospitals.

"Academic institutions have been faced witherosion of their referral base and reductions incensus," a planning document obtained by the Globesaid.

Other hospitals in the Consortium include theBarnes Jewish-Christian in St. Louis, theCeders-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, theCleveland Clinic, the Georgetown UniversityMedical Center, Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York andthe University of Alabama Hospital at Birmingham.

Additional members may be able to join,according to the Globe.

Cardiac costs are responsible for more than$100 million per year worth of health carespending in the U.S., the largest single healthcare expense.

But one source close to the group predicted tothe Globe that the group would eventually expandinto other major medical care areas, such astreatment of cancer and of depression.

The Consortium hopes to furnish quality carefor "disease management" which will encompasseverything from major operations to preventivecare, while simultaneously keeping down prices

The Consortium seems to have been born out ofthe same factors that spurred MGH and Brigham andWomen's, two of Harvard's traditionally fiercelyindependent teaching hospitals, to announce thiswinter that they were joining forces--thepressures of rising health care costs andcompetition from community-based hospitals.

"Academic institutions have been faced witherosion of their referral base and reductions incensus," a planning document obtained by the Globesaid.

Other hospitals in the Consortium include theBarnes Jewish-Christian in St. Louis, theCeders-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, theCleveland Clinic, the Georgetown UniversityMedical Center, Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York andthe University of Alabama Hospital at Birmingham.

Additional members may be able to join,according to the Globe.

Cardiac costs are responsible for more than$100 million per year worth of health carespending in the U.S., the largest single healthcare expense.

But one source close to the group predicted tothe Globe that the group would eventually expandinto other major medical care areas, such astreatment of cancer and of depression.

The Consortium hopes to furnish quality carefor "disease management" which will encompasseverything from major operations to preventivecare, while simultaneously keeping down prices