As health systems face numerous financial challenges coming out of the pandemic, some are relying on an innovative source of revenue to bridge the gaps: internal venture capital (VC) arms.

At least 23 health systems operate VC arms, according to a tracker from Becker’s Health IT, with the primary goal of generating additional revenue streams, Richard Gundling, SVP of professional practice for the Healthcare Financial Management Association, told Healthcare Brew.

“Certainly coming through the pandemic with lots of increased costs, both for workforce [and] supplies […] there’s going to be a lot of constraints on inpatient care in some of the traditional areas of hospitals and health systems in their revenue streams,” Gundling said. “[VC] is another opportunity to be able to have growth.”

Keep reading here.—MA

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One federal agency has found a mechanism for the Biden administration to lower drug costs: a little-known provision from a 44-year-old law called march-in rights. And by adding some tweaks to the law, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) believes it can help the US government go up against drug companies.

NIST has begun the process of making high costs a reason for the government to invoke march-in rights, which would (in theory) compel pharmaceutical companies to lower their prices or risk losing out on exclusive patents—formulas that are billion-dollar moneymakers for the likes of Pfizer, Astellas, and other drug companies.

“We’re taking a very important step toward ending price gouging,” President Joe Biden said in a statement as part of the December 2023 announcement that listed march-in rights as a central strategy to tackling drug costs.

Keep reading here.—WP

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When a clinician admits a Medicare beneficiary for inpatient care, their choice may have been influenced by a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) standard that sounds like a term from a spy novel: the two-midnight rule.

The two-midnight rule is used when a clinician believes that a Medicare beneficiary needs hospital care that will likely eclipse two midnights—requiring inpatient care instead of cheaper outpatient care, Regan Tankersley, an attorney at the law firm Hall Render who advises healthcare systems, told Healthcare Brew.

“It’s a more expensive setting, it’s more expensive care, and so it costs more for the payer,” she said.

Keep reading here.—WP

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