Fierce HealthCare reports: California hospitals have made their first official disclosures of never events occurring in their facilities. The disclosures, which cover the period between July 2007 and May 2008, address 28 never events specified in the legislation (state law enacted in 2006).

From Modern Healthcare News: California’s health insurers trade group is supporting the prohibition on reimbursing providers on “never events”.

The board for the California Association of Health Plans unanimously passed a decision in favor of no longer paying for eight never events.

The California Association is also endorsing a bill that would prohibit providers from billing payers for adverse events that cause the death or injury of a patient.

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Rebecca Vesely’s,

Hanh Kim Quach at the California Progress Report notes that AB 2967 passed the Assembly and has been sent to Senate. The bill would create the California Health Care Cost and Quality Transparency Committee and would begin a comprehensive statewide data collection effort to spur public reporting of cost and quality across the spectrum, including doctors, hospitals, other facilities, other licensed caregivers, managed care and more.

Fierce Healthcare: A new bill is currently being reviewed by California’s state Senate to allow pharmacies to sell patients prescription information to third-party marketing firms working for pharmaceutical companies.

Once approved, the legislation would let pharmacies send mailings directly to patients. This can help to remind patients to take their medication and when to order a refill of their prescription.

Hospitals in California are opposing efforts to publicly report infection rates, although at least five other states mandate such reporting (iHealthBeat). California lags behind at least 15 other states in monitoring hospital-acquired infections.

Hospitals in California are now required to report to local health authorities certain kinds of staph infections that result in death or a stay in the intensive-care unit, reports San Francisco Chronicle.

The new reporting requirement is limited to cases that start outside hospitals or nursing homes in otherwise healthy people - leaving out about 85 percent of life-threatening encounters with the most feared bug, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA.

The California hospital quality site (CalHospitalCompare.org), which provides ratings for 210 California hospitals, has been expanded to include mortality rates for intensive care units, hospitals' efforts in stopping bedsores and work aimed at eliminating complications when respirators are used, reports Ventura County Star.

San Francisco Chronicle: A study released Tuesday found the uninsured in California still pay more on average for services than government payers such as Medicare.

Researchers for the Rand Corp. and the University of Southern California found the state's hospitals collect a higher percentage of their listed charges from the uninsured than they do from Medicare.

California's Office of Statewide Health Planning and Developement (OSHPD) unveiled a new Web site intended to help consumers compare charity care and discount payment policies at hospitals statewide.

Modern Healthcare: A large number of California hospitals appear to be overcharging patients and are not being held accountable for it, according to a new report commissioned by the Pacific Business Group on Health and the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS).

Healthcare Finance Review reports WellPoint will be using a healthcare product created Zagat to allow consumers to rate their overall experience with their doctors, but will not be tied to reimbursement levels. WellPoint plans to launch the rating system among its some 35,000 members using Blue Cross and/or Blue Shield subsidiaries in metropolitan Los Angeles, Connecticut and greater Cincinnati and Dayton, Ohio markets.

An interactive tool for Northern California hospitals was recently launched to help spotlight the health needs in the Capital Region.

The State of California (CA.gov) recently released its annual Health Care Quality Report Card. As reported in Modern Healthcare Online, none of California’s nine largest HMOs got top marks in this year's quality report card compiled by the state. The health plans, representing 19 million Californians, failed to make the grade in categories such as cancer detection, maternity care and pediatrics.

News item in FierceHealthcare.com: a bill which would have disclosed hospital infection and death rates to the public was vetoed by California's Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (R). While Schwarzenegger's own healthcare bill contains some data collection provisions, it wouldn't require the state to release any information to the public. The decision is a victory for the California Hospital Association, which had opposed the disclosures.

AHA News reports that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will solicit home health agencies in seven states to participate in a two-year pay-for-performance demonstration to begin in January. The states are Alabama, California, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts and Tennessee.