Nevada lawmaker calls for crackdown on private hospitals

Responding to a recent health care dispute that nearly caused a hospital crisis in Las Vegas, the chairwoman of the Assembly Health and Human Services Committee is calling for tighter state monitoring of private hospitals.

Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie said Thursday that her committee will look into reinstating cost-containment measures and mandating more transparent revenue reporting.

Leslie called a special hearing to investigate the deal reached Tuesday between the Nashville-based Hospital Corporation of America and the Health Services Coalition, a group representing teachers, firefighters, police and correctional officers in Clark County.

Contract negotiations between the groups had stalled before Gov. Kenny Guinn intervened at the last minute. HCA agreed to a 10 percent rate increase per year for three years. Had the contract expired, some 320,000 HCA members would have been forced to pay out-of-pocket for care at Sunrise, Southern Hills and Mountain View hospitals.

Leslie commended both sides for the resolution, but said the agreement is a stopgap that does not solve the root problem.

"We concerned that we're in this cycle," she said. "It all boils down to providing accessible and affordable health care, and that's clearly a problem in this state."

Leslie said she's requested a report on cost-containment options.

In 1987, then-Gov. Richard Bryan wrote a cost-containment bill because the state's for-profit hospitals had the highest rates in the nation. The bill sunset in 1999 and legislators made no attempt to extend it.

In 1991, under then-Gov Bob Miller, another cost-containment bill froze hospital rates for one year and set price controls for three years.

Leslie said she wanted to know more about how the restrictions were implemented and why they were not extended. The report also will investigate how hospitals report revenue and respond to community needs.

"How do we know, when a company reports a profit, how do we know they're real?" Leslie said.

Leslie and other Democratic lawmakers have recently taken aim at private hospitals in southern Nevada for decreasing the number of beds available to psychiatric patients, while increasing surgical services that earn higher profit. Las Vegas is experiencing a dramatic shortage of psychiatric care.

"We need to better understand the balance between profit and community needs," Leslie said. "Maybe we need to tie profits to community need."

Other Democratic leaders have similar concerns. In remarks on the first day of session, Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, D-Henderson, called for a measure that would force hospitals to invest part of their profits into local programs before they pay off corporate headquarters.

Leslie plans to introduce a health care transparency bill that would standardize how hospitals report the number of uninsured they serve and how they report profits to their out-of-state parent companies.