The past two weeks have seen a lot of Medicare-related news. For starters, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a series of proposed Medicare payment rules for federal fiscal year 2020, including:​

Today health care industry conversations often veer toward innovation. This isn’t new for research, clinical advancement, care delivery, diagnostic tests, surgical procedures and the like; but we now think about it in relationship to, well, just about everything.​

The 439th session of the Maryland General Assembly, which ended April 8, was a strong 90 days for our state’s hospitals and health systems.

Maryland’s hospitals embrace an innovative, far-reaching model of health care delivery that holds the promise to keep people healthier and reduce the overall cost of providing care for all.​ To help meet these goals, the state’s hospitals work to address the causes of poor health and disease risk in our communities, which often are rooted in how and where we live, learn, work, and play.

Heartbreaking news out of Parkland, Fla., and Newtown, Conn., in recent weeks — in which survivors and loved ones of those affected by violence died by suicide — have put the devastating effects of trauma in the spotlight.​ Maryland’s health care leaders are all too familiar with the long-term effects of violence, natural disasters, and other harrowing events. You see suffering in the community. You know that health care workers may experience serious secondary trauma while caring for patients.

Our nation has entered a new political season, and a vocal group of elected officials and presidential candidates are promoting a single-payer health care system, or Medicare for All.​ Hospitals in Maryland, and nationwide, support universal coverage. And we cannot deny that our current system has flaws. Though, as David Brooks explained in plain language recently, moving to a single-payer system run by the federal government is impractical.​