Tag Archives: Community Benefits

Amid labor talks, union unveils billboards highlighting Cedars-Sinai profits, CEO pay

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/human-capital-and-risk/amid-labor-talks-union-unveils-billboards-highlighting-cedars-sinai-profits-ceo-pay.html

Image result for SEIU-UHW cedar sinai medical center billboards

Healthcare workers at Los Angeles-based Cedars-Sinai Medical Center revealed a series of billboards that highlights profits and CEO pay at the hospital.  

The workers, who are represented by Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West, announced the billboards April 2 amid contract negotiations. The billboards are scheduled to appear throughout April at seven locations that are all within 1.5 miles of the hospital.

A union news release says the billboards aim to draw attention to “excessive profits and CEO compensation,” as well as the amount of charity care the nonprofit hospital provides.

“The public deserves to know that this elite hospital with huge profits and obscene CEO compensation, isn’t acting in the public’s best interests,” Dave Regan, president of SEIU-UHW, said in the release. “On top of paying no income or property taxes, Cedars-Sinai skimps when it comes time to care for the poorest people in our community.”

The hospital  addressed the union’s claims.

“The Cedars-Sinai Board of Directors believes in providing every one of our employees with compensation that is based upon merit of their individual performance, a rigorous review of each position’s responsibilities, and comparisons with other organizations for positions with similar responsibilities. For the president and CEO, the review process is even more extensive,” the statement said.

“[CEO]Tom Priselac’s compensation appropriately reflects his more than two-decade tenure of successfully presiding over the western United States’ largest nonprofit hospital. Under his leadership, Cedars-Sinai has earned national recognition for delivering the highest quality care to patients and has been ranked among the top medical centers in the country.

“Over the last 10 years alone, Cedars-Sinai has invested nearly $6 billion to benefit the local community by, among other things, providing free or part-pay care for patients who cannot afford treatment; by losses caring for Medicare and Medi-Cal patients; and by providing a wide range of free health programs and clinics in neighborhoods as well as education, health and fitness services in dozens of local schools.”

SEIU-UHW represents more than 1,800 service and technical workers at the hospital. The last contract with Cedars-Sinai expired March 31.

 

 

 

Kaiser Permanente waives tuition for first 5 medical school classes

Posted on by • Posted in Uncategorized • Tagged , , , , , , • Leave a comment

https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/hospital-physician-relationships/kaiser-permanente-waives-tuition-for-first-5-medical-school-classes.html

Image result for kaiser medical school

Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente announced its intent Feb. 19 to waive all four years of tuition for the first five classes of students admitted to its new medical school.

Kaiser officials said in a news release obtained by Becker’s Hospital Review that its medical school has received preliminary accreditation from the Liaison Committee on Medical Education and will begin accepting applications from prospective students in June 2019 for its inaugural class in summer 2020. Each class will contain roughly 48 students, according to The New York Times.

Mark Schuster, MD, PhD, founding dean and CEO of the Pasadena, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente School of Medicine, told The New York Times that while the institution only plans to cover the entire $55,000-per-year tuition for all of its first five classes of students, Kaiser will offer “very generous financial aid” based on need for future students.

Kaiser is the second institution to announce that it will waive tuition for students. Last August, the New York City-based NYU School of Medicine declared plans to cover its entire tuition costs for all students, which equates to more than 400 students across classes.

While NYU raised $600 million from donors to pay for its tuition plan, Kaiser is using a portion of its revenue set aside for “community benefits,” which all nonprofit hospitals have to provide to maintain their tax-exempt status, according to The New York Times. The health system, which has an operating revenue of nearly $73 billion, spent $2.3 billion on community benefits in 2017, including charity care for the uninsured and community health spending.

The medical school will be one of the only medical schools in the U.S. to be affiliated with a hospital or health system, not a university, The New York Times reports. Its curriculum will include a focus on small-group, case-based learning, and students will travel to the health system’s hospitals and clinics in the greater Los Angeles area for their clinical education.

“We’ve had the opportunity to build a medical school from the ground up and have drawn from evidence-based educational approaches to develop a state-of-the-art school on the forefront of medical education, committed to preparing students to provide outstanding patient care in our nation’s complex and evolving healthcare system,” said Dr. Schuster said in a news release.

In December, Kaiser added 11 executives to the medical school’s leadership team.

To access the full report, click here.