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Author: Harold Brubaker

  • Temple Health reported a $15 million operating loss in the first quarter of fiscal 2026

    Temple Health reported a $15 million operating loss in the first quarter of fiscal 2026

    Temple University Health System reported a $15 million operating loss in the three months that ended Sept. 30.

    The result for the first quarter of fiscal 2026 was an improvement from the North Philadelphia nonprofit’s $17 million loss last year.

    “We’re pretty happy where we are,” CEO Mike Young said Wednesday. Revenue was above budget and labor costs were on budget in the first quarter for the first time in several years.

    Here are some details:

    Revenue: Total revenue was $800 million, up 13% from $712.5 million a year ago. Outpatient revenue increased by nearly $62 million, much of it from the health system’s specialty and retail pharmacy business.

    Temple participates in a federal program for safety-net hospitals that allows it to buy certain drugs at a discount and then get full reimbursement from insurance companies.

    Expenses: Temple noted in its report to municipal bond investors Tuesday that salaries, including higher pay rates for nurses, and higher drug spending for outpatient infusions and other pharmacy business were the biggest expense increases.

    Notable: On the labor front, several job categories remain hard to fill, Young said. Those are CT techs, nurse anesthetists, and lab techs. “Other than those three [specialties], it’s not where it was three years ago, where you couldn’t find anybody,” he said.

  • Jefferson Health hit with federal WARN Act lawsuit

    Jefferson Health hit with federal WARN Act lawsuit

    A lawsuit filed Tuesday in Philadelphia accused Jefferson Health of violating federal labor rules when it laid off 1% of its 65,000 employees in October and this month without providing a 60-day notice.

    The purported class-action lawsuit says the proposed lead plaintiff, Ciara Brice, lost her job as a medical assistant on Nov. 12 with no notice and has not received the severance pay she was promised.

    Brice was not available for comment, said her lawyer, Jeremy E. Abay, with Philadelphia law firm Pond Lehocky Giordano Inc.

    The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act has a complicated rubric for determining when a mass layoff requires advance notification, which is filed with state labor departments. One of the triggers is an employer cutting at least 500 jobs, according to Abay.

    Even though the layoffs happened throughout Jefferson’s entire footprint from South Jersey to near Scranton, Abay said notice is required because Jefferson operates as a single entity.

    “We believe the facts will show that there was no violation of the federal WARN Act,” Jefferson said in a statement.

    The nonprofit filed a notice of 108 layoffs at Jefferson Cherry Hill Hospital, Jefferson Stratford Hospital, and Jefferson Washington Township Hospital because New Jersey has its own rules, Abay said.

    In August, Jefferson reported a $195 million operating loss on $15.8 billion in revenue for the year that ended June 30.

    The nonprofit, which grew through acquisitions from three hospitals in Philadelphia in 2015 to more than 30 now, provided no details when it announced the layoffs in mid-October.

    That layoff was part of a series of large job cuts starting in the summer of 2023, but may have been the first time patient-facing workers like Brice were hit.

    The lawsuit seeks back pay, benefits, and damages for each laid-off employee who did not receive a 60-day notice.

    Editor’s note: The headline on this article has been updated to clarify that a lawsuit claims violations.

  • A Philadelphia jury reached $35 million verdict against Main Line Health and Penn Medicine for cancer misdiagnosis

    A Philadelphia jury reached $35 million verdict against Main Line Health and Penn Medicine for cancer misdiagnosis

    A Philadelphia jury reached $35 million verdict last week against Main Line Health and the University of Pennsylvania Health System for a cancer misdiagnosis that led a then-45-year old Philadelphia resident to undergo a total hysterectomy in 2021.

    Main Line discovered later that the biopsy slides used to make the diagnosis in February 2021 were contaminated. The cancer diagnosis was due an error that involved a second person’s DNA, not that of the plaintiff, Iris Spencer, who did not have cancer.

    Main Line settled with Spencer in 2022 for an undisclosed amount, so it won’t have to pay its share of the verdict.

    The jury found Penn and its physician, Janos Tanyi, a gynecological oncologist, liable for $12.25 million, or 35%, of the total awarded in damages for her unnecessary hysterectomy. The lawsuit said Spencer suffers from “surgically-induced menopause.”

    The lawsuit against Penn and Tanyi said the physician did not do enough to resolve a conflict between biopsy results at Main Line and those at Penn, where Spencer sought a second opinion.

    A Penn biopsy did not find cancer. Other tests were also negative, but Spencer did not know about those results.

    “The verdict affirms the central importance of the patient and the doctor’s obligation to inform the patient of all of the test results, of all of her options, and that she shouldn’t be dismissed because she’s a patient and not a doctor,” Spencer’s lawyer, Glenn A. Ellis, said Monday.

    The $35 million verdict is Philadelphia’s largest this year for medical malpractice, according to data from the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas.

    Medical malpractice costs have been rising throughout healthcare. A factor in Pennsylvania is a 2023 rule change that allowed more flexibility in where cases can be filed.

    In 2023, a Philadelphia jury issued a state record $183 million verdict against the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in a birth injury case.

    A laboratory mistake

    Spencer’s troubles started in February 2021 at Main Line’s Lankenau Medical Center where her biopsy found that she had cancer in the lining of her uterus despite the lack of symptoms.

    For a second opinion, Spencer saw Tanyi at Penn a few days later. A repeat biopsy came back negative, according to Spencer’s complaint that was filed in early 2023. Tanyi also performed other tests, all of which came back negative, but he did not share that information with Spencer, the complaint says.

    After Tanyi performed the complete hysterectomy on March 8, 2021, Penn’s pathology laboratory found no cancer in the tissues that had been removed from Spencer’s body.

    That’s when Spencer, who has since moved to Georgia, went back to Lankenau seeking an explanation. Seven months later, Main Line informed her that she never had cancer.

    Main Line and Spencer subsequently “reached an amicable full and final settlement to resolve and discharge all potential claims for care involving the health system,” Main Line said in a statement. Main Line did not participate in the trial.

    Penn said in a statement: “We are disappointed by the jury’s verdict in this case that was unmoored to the evidence presented at trial on negligence and damages. Our physician reasonably relied on the pathology performed at a hospital outside our system that revealed a very aggressive cancer.”

    Penn said it plans to appeal the verdict, which could increase by more than $2 million if the court approves a motion for delay damages that Ellis filed Saturday.

  • Temple Health says its new medical malpractice strategy is working

    Temple Health says its new medical malpractice strategy is working

    Temple University Health System‘s medical malpractice expenses have surged in the two years that ended June 30 as part of a campaign to reduce financial risk by settling old cases.

    The hope is that “aggressively” settling cases will pay off over the next few years by reducing medical malpractice expenses, Michael DiFranco, the health system’s chief accounting officer, told investors during a conference call last week on the health system’s fiscal 2025 financial results.

    Temple Health has 12,000 faculty members and employees who work mainly on five hospital campuses. Its fiscal 2025 revenue was $3.3 billion.

    Temple’s annual medical malpractice expenses increased nearly fourfold, to $117.8 million in fiscal 2025 from $31.6 million two years ago. Over the same period, it cut its reserves for future expenses by $88 million, or 22%. Temple’s reserves peaked at $402.9 million in 2023.

    Rising medical malpractice costs are reverberating throughout healthcare. Tower Health recently boosted its reserves after its auditor decided they should be higher to deal with anticipated claims. Lifecycle Wellness, a birth center in Bryn Mawr, blamed its decision to stop delivering babies in February in part on rising medical malpractice costs.

    The average number of medical malpractice lawsuits filed in Philadelphia every month has risen from 34 and 35 in the two years before the pandemic to 51 last year and 52 so far this year, according to the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas. In additional to lawsuits against hospitals, the tally includes litigation against physicians, nursing homes, and other healthcare providers.

    Contributing to the increase was a rule change at the beginning of 2023 that allowed more cases to be filed in Philadelphia rather than the county where an injury occurred. Malpractice lawyers say they like to file in Philadelphia because the system for trying cases is efficient. Health systems often note that Philadelphia juries sometimes award large verdicts.

    A ‘wake-up call’ at Temple

    Temple Health started rethinking its medical malpractice strategy after John Ryan started as general counsel in January 2022. A month before he started, The Inquirer published an article about three suicides at Temple Episcopal Hospital in 2020. At least two of the families sued Temple.

    “That was a wake-up call,” Ryan said in a recent interview on his approach to handling malpractice cases.

    Then in May 2023, a Philadelphia jury hit Temple with a $25.9 million verdict in a case involving a delayed diagnosis of a leg injury leading to an amputation.

    After that loss, Temple changed the kinds of outside lawyers it hires to defend it in malpractice cases, Ryan said, swapping medical malpractice specialists for commercial litigators from firms like Blank Rome, Cozen O’Connor, and Duane Morris. Such lawyers cost more, but it’s paying off, he said.

    “The settlements we’re getting from the plaintiff lawyers, because they can see that we’re serious, are much better,” Ryan said. The two Episcopal cases were settled this year for undisclosed amounts, according to court records. A birth-injury lawsuit against Temple University Hospital in federal court settled for $8 million this month.

    In 2024, a jury awarded $45 million to a teen who was shot in the neck and suffered brain damage from aspirating food soon after his release from Temple. Temple appealed and the judge who oversaw the original trial ordered a new one. That case then settled at the end of October for an undisclosed amount.

    The new approach has helped Temple reduce the number of outstanding cases at any one time to 65 or so now compared to 110 three years ago, according to Ryan.

    Temple is using the money it is saving on malpractice costs to invest in better and safer care, Ryan said. “That’s not a byproduct of all we’re trying to do as the lawyers. It’s the goal,” he said.

    Inquirer staff reporter Abraham Gutman contributed to this article.

  • Bayada Home Health Care has appointed Bryony Winn as next CEO

    Bayada Home Health Care has appointed Bryony Winn as next CEO

    Bayada Home Health Care, a Moorestown nonprofit that is one of the nation’s largest providers of home health and related services, appointed Bryony Winn as its next CEO, Bayada announced Thursday.

    When she takes over March 2, Winn will be the first outside CEO of the organization that was founded in 1975 by entrepreneur J. Mark Baiada. He turned the company into a nonprofit in 2019.

    Winn will succeed the founder’s son, David, who has been CEO for eight years.

    Until this month, Winn was president of Caralon, a unit of health insurer Elevance that provides assorted services, including prior authorizations, to other health plans. Before that, she worked at Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina and as a consultant at McKinsey & Co.

    “Leading an organization like Bayada is the opportunity of a lifetime,” Winn said. “It’s a special organization that makes a real, tangible impact on people and health worldwide. I can’t wait to get started.”

    Until Winn arrives, David Baiada will remain CEO, and then will join the organization’s board of directors and act as an adviser to Winn.

    Bayada had roughly $2 billion in annual revenue last year, the organization said. In addition to traditional home healthcare, Bayada offers private-duty nursing and hospice care.

    In June, Bayada laid off about 10% of the staff in its Pennsauken offices, where back-office and other services are provided for the entire company. Bayada employs more than 30,000 people.

  • Eli Lilly & Co. is opening a Lilly Gateway Labs biotech incubator in Philadelphia

    Eli Lilly & Co. is opening a Lilly Gateway Labs biotech incubator in Philadelphia

    Philadelphia is the newest destination for Lilly Gateway Labs, an incubator for early-stage biotech companies backed by pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly & Co., the company announced Wednesday.

    The Center City incubator will be Lilly’s fifth in the United States. Biotech hotbeds Boston, South San Francisco, and San Diego already have them. (South San Francisco has two.) Companies at those locations have raised more than $3 billion from investors since the program started in 2019, Lilly said.

    Lilly’s Philadelphia operation will occupy 44,000 square feet on the first two levels of 2300 Market St. in Center City.

    Lilly expects to house six to eight companies there, aiming to welcome the first startups to the site in the first quarter of next year, said Julie Gilmore, global head of Lilly Gateway Labs. She did not identify prospects.

    Typically, Gateway Labs residents are at the stage of raising their first significant round of capital from investors, called Series A, and are two or three years from clinical testing, she said.

    The arrival of high-profile Lilly, which has seen resounding success with its GLP-1 drugs for diabetes and weight loss, could turn out to be a shot in the arm for a local biotech scene. Philadelphia has a growing biotech sector but has lagged places like Boston, despite the presence of world-class scientists at local research universities. Their work has fueled groundbreaking discoveries in cell and gene therapy, as well as vaccines.

    But Lilly is interested in supporting ideas that go beyond the city’s cell and gene therapy strengths, said Gilmore. Gateway labs is part of Lilly’s Catalyze360 Portfolio Management unit, which provides broad support to fledgling biotech firms, including venture capital.

    “What we like is to go after innovative science. Who are the companies trying to solve really hard problems?” Gilmore said. “And we do know that Philadelphia has had a ton of success in gene therapy and CAR-T and I hope we can find some great companies in that space, but we’re going to be open to other types of innovative science as well.”

    Expanding Philly’s life sciences footprint

    Indianapolis-based Lilly already has a small presence in Philadelphia with Avid Radiopharmaceuticals Inc., a company it acquired in 2010. Avid still operates in University City. Lilly’s chief scientific officer, Daniel Skovronsky, founded Avid in 2004 after receiving a doctorate in neuroscience and a medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania.

    Lilly is interviewing people to lead Philadelphia’s Gateway Labs location. They like to hire people who are familiar with the local universities and venture funds for those jobs, but that’s not all that matters. “We’re also looking for somebody who’s got deep drug development expertise,” Gilmore said.

    Lilly’s incubator adds to the life sciences activity at 23rd and Market Streets.

    Breakthrough Properties, a Los-Angeles-based joint venture of Tishman Speyer and Bellco Capital, announced plans for the eight-story, 225,000 square-foot building in 2022. Last week, Legend Biotech, which is headquartered in Somerset, N.J., celebrated the opening of a new cell therapy research center on the building’s third floor.

    Lilly Gateway Labs companies agree to stay for at least two years, and they can apply for up to another two years, Gilmore said.

    “The goal is, a company moves in and they can just worry about their science, worry about their team, and moving their mission forward, and we try to take care of everything else,” she said.

  • Philadelphia’s Center for Advocacy for the Rights and Interests of Elders is closing next week after nearly 50 years

    Philadelphia’s nonprofit Center for Advocacy for the Rights and Interests of Elders, known as CARIE, is closing next Wednesday after nearly 50 years, the organization’s board announced Tuesday in an email to supporters.

    Few details were available on what led to the decision to close abruptly the day before Thanksgiving. CARIE’s new executive director, Brian Gralnick, did not reply to an email or voicemail asking for more information.

    Board chair Joan Davitt, an associate professor and geriatric scholar at the University of Maryland School of Social Work who lives in the Philadelphia area, also did not respond to requests for comment.

    The organization lists 26 employees on its website. Its most recent audited financial statements show that it had $2.9 million in revenue and a $177,307 operating loss in the year that ended June 30, 2024.

    An unaudited financial report for the seven months that ended in January warned that CARIE “was facing financial risks, including the potential default on its line of credit.” At the end of January, CARIE only had enough cash to pay its bills for two weeks, the report obtained by The Inquirer said.

    This year, CARIE lost two of its largest contracts, effective next year. Those contracts were to provide long-term care ombudsman services for the elderly in most of Philadelphia and in Montgomery County. An ombudsman’s job is to provide independent advocacy for residents of long-term care facilities and to help resolve complaints about care and living conditions.

    In Philadelphia, CARIE had provided the service since 1981, four years after its founding. Philadelphia Corporation for Aging, which manages the contracts, is still finalizing the selection of the new providers.

    CARIE started providing ombudsman services in Montgomery County in 2022, but the county’s Office of Aging Services is taking the service back in-house on Feb. 1.

    CARIE has lacked stability in senior leadership since the retirement of Diane Menio in March 2023. Menio had been executive director for 34 years.

    Menio’s successor, Whitney Lingle, lasted just 19 months. She was followed by an internal acting executive director for a year. Gralnick took over in September.

  • Tower Health’s audit for fiscal 2025 reversed its reported operating profit

    Tower Health’s audit for fiscal 2025 reversed its reported operating profit

    Tower Health’s preliminary financial report in August for fiscal 2025 showed a $5.9 million operating profit, a gain that came thanks for the sale of a shuttered hospital in Chester County.

    But that apparent annual profit, the Berks County nonprofit’s first since 2017, turned into a $20.6 million loss when Tower released its annual audit.

    Auditors from KPMG decided that Tower should boost medical malpractice reserves and give up on collecting millions owed by patients, Tower said in a statement.

    “As part of our standard accounting process, the audited financials for the full year reflect increased malpractice insurance reserves and final adjustments to accounts receivable,” Tower said.

    Most of the $26 million swing to a loss came from medical malpractice, but Tower also reduced what is called patient accounts receivable, representing unpaid bills, to $236.6 million from $251.6 million in August’s preliminary results, according to Tower’s audited financial statements that were published Friday.

    Separately, Tower reported a $15.9 million operating loss for the three months that ended Sept. 30. That loss was a bit bigger than the $14.2 million loss in the same period last year. Tower’s revenue for the quarter was $501 million, up 4% from $479.8 million last year.

    The results for the first quarter of 2026 did not include expenses for Tower’s layoff of 350 employees, or about 3% of its workforce, earlier this month. The cuts hit Pottstown Hospital particularly hard. Tower is eliminating 131 jobs there and eliminating some services.

    The closures include the combined intensive care/critical care unit, the Pottstown location of the McGlinn Cancer Institute, and the hospital’s endoscopy center.

    Two unions that represent Pottstown employees, the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals and SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania have decried the cuts and called on management to engage in discussions on how to preserve jobs and services.

  • Pa.’s new budget has financial help for Delco’s Riddle and Mercy Fitzgerald Hospitals

    Pa.’s new budget has financial help for Delco’s Riddle and Mercy Fitzgerald Hospitals

    Pennsylvania’s new budget has $5 million in supplemental payments for the two Delaware County Hospitals that have seen significant increases in patient volumes since Crozer-Chester Medical Center and Taylor Hospital closed in the spring.

    Main Line Health’s Riddle Hospital, near Media, is getting $3 million. The amount for Trinity Health Mid-Atlantic’s Mercy Fitzgerald Hospital, in Darby, is $2 million, according to budget documents.

    The $5 million will be doubled by a federal match, said Democratic State Sen. Tim Kearney, who represents part of Delaware County. The $5 million is from a fund used to help hospitals the serve a large number of patients with Medicaid and used to go to Crozer Health, Kearney said Friday.

    Main Line said in a statement Thursday that the money will help it maintain services in the county.

    Pa. lawmakers and Gov. Josh Shapiro have approved a $50.1 billion state budget, officially ending monthslong impasse

    “Since Crozer’s shutdown in April, Riddle’s Emergency Department has experienced an unprecedented surge — 46% more patients than the same period last year, an increase of nearly 4,000 overall,“ the nonprofit said.

    Main Line, which also owns Lankenau Medical Center, Bryn Mawr Hospital, and Paoli Hospital, said it has seen 55,000 patients from the Crozer market — a 15% increase over the same time period last year. That figure includes 8,000 patients who went to a Main Line facility for the first time, the health system said.

    Trinity Health did not respond to a request for comment.

    Shuttered hospitals in limbo

    While Riddle and Mercy Fitzgerald have scrambled to accommodate patients who used to rely on Crozer Health, efforts are underway to bring healthcare services back to at least Taylor Hospital in Ridley.

    Local investors bought that facility in September for $1 million and are trying to entice one of the region’s nonprofit health systems to bring it back as a hospital.

    A group from New Jersey called Chariot Allaire Partners LLC has agreed to pay $10 million for the former Crozer-Chester Medical Center in Upland but has not disclosed its plans. That facility served as a key safety provider for a low-income area of Delaware County.

    A partnership of Restorative Health Foundation and Syan Investments won an auction for Springfield Hospital for $3 million, but it does not have support from township officials.

    Delaware County legislators also obtained $1 million from the state to buy emergency department equipment if one of the closed hospitals, such as Taylor, reopens, Kearney said.

    Editor’s note: This story has been updated with additional detail on the funding.

    This suburban content is produced with support from the Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation and The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Editorial content is created independently of the project donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com/donate. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org/supporters.

  • Jefferson Health says it will terminate Lehigh Valley Health Network’s contracts with UnitedHealthcare

    Jefferson Health says it will terminate Lehigh Valley Health Network’s contracts with UnitedHealthcare

    Jefferson Health says it will terminate Lehigh Valley Health Network’s contracts with UnitedHealthcare next year, stating United, the nation’s largest health insurer, is paying less than their negotiated rates, Jefferson said Monday.

    The contracts will remain in effect until Jan. 26 for Medicare Advantage patients and until April 25 for patients with commercial insurance through their employer. In the last 18 months, Lehigh Valley Health facilities treated 70,000 people with United insurance, Jefferson said.

    “Like all health systems, we are facing significant headwinds as costs rise faster than reimbursement,” Mark Whalen, Jefferson’s chief strategy and transformation officer, said in an email.

    “When reimbursement falls substantially below negotiated levels, it threatens our ability to fulfill our mission of providing exceptional care to all patients.”

    Whalen said Jefferson will continue working to secure a better deal with United, as it has for more than two years.

    United said in a statement that its most recent proposal went to Lehigh Valley in April. “We have yet to receive a counter proposal from the health system, whose last proposal was provided in December 2024 and included a near 30% price hike in the first year of our contract,” the statement said.

    Jefferson countered with a statement saying that its dealings with United are not part of a normal contract renegotiation. “This ongoing dispute is caused by United Healthcare’s implementation of a multiyear 30% price decrease that was not agreed to, not accepted and is not sustainable, Whalen said.

    The timing of the United announcement is noteworthy. Medicare Advantage open enrollment is underway until Dec. 7 for plans that take effect Jan. 1.

    The potential termination of United’s Medicare plans on Jan. 26 puts United’s customers who depend on Lehigh Valley for health services in a quandary. Should they stick with United or switch to another plan, such as those offered by Jefferson’s insurance arm?

    United said Jefferson’s decision to make its announcement during open enrollment looked like “a negotiating tactic.”

    The Minnesota company has about 27,500 Medicare Advantage enrollees in the main counties served by Lehigh Valley Health doctors, according to federal data from September.

    The impasse does not affect Philadelphia-area Jefferson patients with insurance from UnitedHealthcare.

    Insurance regulations require notice to patients before contracts end.

    In March, Jefferson went out-of-network with Cigna Health for a few weeks during a similar impasse in negotiations. Jefferson and Cigna quickly reached a deal after the termination.