Wall Street Journal Examines Concerns Over Large Not-for-Profit Hospital System In Southwestern Virginia

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The Wall Street Journal on Thursday profiled Carilion Health System, a large not-for-profit hospital system in southwestern Virginia that critics maintain has created a monopoly on health charge services in the area.

According to the Journal, not-for-profit hospitals, which story for the majority of U.S. hospitals, receive task exemptions and "are alleged to line the income they generate back into operations, piece providing benefits to their communities." However, not-for-profit hospitals have "total under fire from patient advocates and members of Congress for "stinting on charity concern, even as they amass large hard cash hoards, build new facilities and honor big paychecks to their executives," the Journal reports.

In the case of Carilion, the Department of Justice in 1989 filed a failed antimonopoly lawsuit in an exploit to halt a unification between Carilion and a local hospital over concerns that the move would create a monopoly on health charge services in the area. Almost 20 years later, health upkeep costs in the area are "soaring," and health insurance agiotage rates in the area have increased from the lowest in the state to the highest, the Journal reports.

Carilion charges four to 10 times as much for some health attention services as other providers in the area, just, with eight hospitals, 11,000 employees and $1 billion in assets, residents in most cases must seek care through the hospital system or locomote outside the area. In addition, although Carilion receives about $50 million each year in tax exemptions, the hospital system spent merely $42 1000000 in charity care in 2007 and only $30 million in 2006.

Carilion officials maintain that the hospital system does not have a monopoly on health forethought services in the sphere because of competition from Lewis-Gale Medical Center, a hospital owned by for-profit chain HCA. In addition, "Carilion says it charges more for certain procedures because it has to subsidize operations such as an emergency department and treatment for the uninsured," according to the Journal. Carilion CEO Edward Murphy also said that the increase in health forethought costs in the area is part of a national drift and has resulted from overuse of services (Carreyrou, Wall Street Journal, 8/27).


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