I-Team In-Depth

Hospitals Bill More Than $1 Billion In Facility Fees Over Two Years

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Connecticut consumers were billed for more than $1 billion in facility fees for outpatient services in 2015 and 2016, documents filed with the state Office of Health Care Access (OHCA) show. Twenty-two of Connecticut’s 30 hospitals charged these fees, bringing in $600.7 million in 2015 and another $488.8 million in 2016, according to an analysis by Conn. Health I-Team. The state’s two largest hospital systems, Yale New Haven Health and Hartford HealthCare, accounted for almost half of the total facility fee revenue in 2016. Yale and its four hospitals billed $144.3 million; Hartford and its five hospitals, $80.9 million.

Disparities

Report: 27 Facilities Using Hazardous Chemicals Pose Risk To Thousands Of Low-Income Neighbors

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There are 27 facilities in Connecticut that use such large quantities of hazardous chemicals that they are required to submit disaster response plans to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. About 170,000 people—roughly 5 percent of the state’s population—live within a mile of these facilities, risking exposure to a leak, explosion or adverse health effects. Low-income people and children of color under the age of 12 are more likely than their white counterparts to live in these “fenceline” communities, according to a report by the Center for Effective Government. In its report “Living in the Shadow of Danger: Poverty, Race and Unequal Chemical Facility Hazards,” the center examined more than 12,500 facilities in 50 states, grading states based on the “disparities faced” by people living adjacent to or near these facilities. The center reported that children of color under age 12 living in the state were 2.2 times more likely than white children to live within a mile of one of these facilities. In many instances, residents are unaware of the dangers just blocks from their homes, the report said.

I-Team In-Depth

Court Awards, Settlements Rising In Distracted Driving Lawsuits

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A New Britain couple, seriously hurt in a cellphone-related car accident on Route 8 in Harwinton, received a $1.3 million settlement in November. The previous year, a jury awarded a Torrington woman $1.4 million after a driver, talking on his cellphone while turning, struck her head-on, breaking her wrist and causing permanent injuries to her neck and back. These are two of the largest awards or settlements to go to motorists injured in crashes since Connecticut’s ban on talking and texting on cellphones went into effect in 2005, and a recent change to court procedure may pave the way for more large settlements. Despite the large awards, the incidence of fatalities and injuries from motor vehicle accidents in the state has continued to rise in recent years, state data indicates. The total number of car crashes increased every year from 2011 to 2016– from 78,433 in 2011, to 116,117 last year — according to UCONN’s Connecticut Crash Data Repository, which contains data that the state Department of Transportation collects.

‘Model’ Nursing Home For Paroled Inmates To Get Federal Funds

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Inside the 60 West nursing home in Rocky Hill, two residents played solitaire to the sound of soul music. Others sat in wheelchairs beneath a simulation of rolling clouds, while one got a haircut in a barbershop decorated with Red Sox posters. From the outside, the 95-bed, single-story facility set back from the road looks like any other nursing home. But many of the elderly and ill residents are actually paroled prisoners, and the home is being watched nationally as a potential game-changer for states grappling for ways to care for their aging inmate populations. 60 West is the first facility in the country to win approval from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) for federal nursing home funding—a designation that has national significance, experts say, because it’s a new option for cash-strapped states looking for ways to care for growing populations of older and sicker inmates.

Medicaid, ACA Uncertainty Threaten Success Of Ex-Offenders’ Health Care Programs

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Since 2011, Connecticut has issued more than 39,000 new Medicaid cards to prisoners returning to communities, connecting them to health care services with the goal of keeping them healthy and out of prison. This initiative, which gives ex-offenders the opportunity to see a primary care physician on a regular basis and access critical mental health and drug-abuse treatment programs, exists because of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), and Medicaid pays most of the costs. Recidivism data show that the initiative is working, state officials say. Yearly, the Court Support Services Division (CSSD) refers approximately 20,000 adults on probation to various behavioral health programs and tracks them for 12 months. In 2016, CSSD reported that 23.1 percent of adults who completed their referral program were rearrested, a five-year low since CSSD started tracking in 2012.