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Health Care

Plymouth hospital endorses nurse-practice bills

A coastal hospital has joined the groups advocating for a relaxation of the state’s restrictions on advanced-practice nurses. Washington Regional Medical Center has joined a coalition that favors passage of either Senate Bill 537 or House Bill 514. Either would give advanced-practice nurses more latitude to practice outside a physician’s...

By Ray Gronberg

April 15, 2026

Legislators urged to tighten autism-care networks

North Carolina’s four managed care organizations say state legislators have to change the law if they want to get a handle on the exploding Medicaid costs associated with a leading type of autism care. Specifically, they’re urging legislators to allow them to return to a “closed network” that allows them...

By Ray Gronberg

April 9, 2026

FirstHealth sees losses ahead early in 2030s

Executives from Pinehurst-based FirstHealth say the federal government’s One Big Beautiful Bill has put the hospital system on a course that could lead to operating losses by fiscal 2031-32. “We can’t let that happen, we’re not going to let that happen,” FirstHealth CFO Autumn McFann told the members of a...

By Ray Gronberg

April 9, 2026

UNC ups nurse production; legislators unsatisfied

The UNC System says its universities are on track to produce 707 more nurses a year by the 2029-30 school year. Trouble is, that doesn’t fill the 12,459-nurse gap in supply versus demand that UNC Chapel Hill’s Sheps Center for Health Services Research sees coming by 2033. Members of a...

By Ray Gronberg

April 9, 2026

Affordability “covering the gamut,” pollsters say

North Carolinians aren’t happy about the cost of healthcare, with 17%  telling pollsters that they’ve skipped needed care because they can’t afford it. But the consultants who orchestrated the poll, Paul Shumaker and Morgan Jackson, say that’s in line with broader concerns about the affordability of, well, almost everything. “If...

By Ray Gronberg

March 30, 2026

Zaas returning to Duke Health to become its CEO

Dr. David Zaas takes over as CEO of Duke Health on May 1, putting him in charge of an $11 billion enterprise and one of the state’s largest employers. The move comes less than three months after Zaas became CEO of Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist in Winston-Salem. He had...

By Ray Gronberg

March 26, 2026

House panel set to vote in April on bills reducing hospital tax breaks

House leaders seem serious about the idea of cutting back on two key tax breaks for North Carolina’s nonprofit hospitals. Bills pending in the chamber’s Select Committee on Property Tax Reduction and Reform could combine to cost hospitals about $200 million a year, legislative staffers say. One of these would...

By Ray Gronberg

March 19, 2026

State Health Plan still battling deficit projections

New estimates are once again predicting that the State Health Plan faces a deficit in the not-too-distant future. Plan executive administrator Tom Friedman’s briefing of trustees on Tuesday shows its cash balance dropping into negative numbers by the middle of 2027. “We’re candidly never going to be done having to...

By Ray Gronberg

March 18, 2026

Hospital facility fees attacked — and defended

Stalled legislation that would restrict the use of “facility fees” by hospital systems could reduce healthcare costs for North Carolina families by at least $200 million a year. That’s the estimate from the N.C. Association of Health Plans, whose leader, Peter Daniel, spoke Tuesday to members of a House-Senate joint oversight...

By Ray Gronberg

March 11, 2026

Legislators briefed on Medicaid’s rising autism-care costs

Legislators balk when they see the financial cost of Medicaid-funded autism-care services, but the human costs of not paying bother them every bit as much. The House and Senate’s Medicaid oversight panel delved into the issue on Tuesday, hearing from the state Department of Health and Human Services that the...

By Ray Gronberg

March 11, 2026

Treasurer’s office prepping new RFP State Health Plan claims processing

Aetna’s only been administering claims for the State Health Plan for a little over a year, but officials in Treasurer Brad Briner’s office are already looking aheadto perhaps replacing it. The plan’s executive administrator, Thomas Friedman, recently briefedpotential vendors about his expectations going forward. He minced no words, saying he’s...

By Ray Gronberg

March 4, 2026

State Health Plan rolls out first “preferred providers”

State Health Plan trustees have approved “preferred provider” contracts with the clinic networks of UNC Health and two other groups, State Treasurer Brad Briner’s office says. The move is part of the plan’s cost-control strategy and addresses the primary care needs of its members. Follow-on decisions will address speciality, maternity...

By Ray Gronberg

January 30, 2026

Conservative group eyes case against nurse-practice limits

A California-based conservative group wants to take on North Carolina’s restrictions on advanced-practice nurses, even as the so-called SAVE Act remains bogged down on the General Assembly. The Pacific Legal Foundation, which bills itself as a “national public interest law firm, says it’s looking for nurses who want to challenge...

By Ray Gronberg

December 17, 2025

Duke Health gets OK for tax-exempt bond issue

Duke Health has gained access to up to $275.7 million in tax-exempt bonds to cover the cost of its purchase in April of the former Lake Norman Regional Medical Center. Local Government Commission members signed off on the issue on Tuesday, during their last meeting of 2025. There was no...

By Ray Gronberg

December 3, 2025

State Health Plan staving off projected deficit, for now

The State Health Plan is out of the woods financially, at least for the short term, but members are likely to see further premium and benefits changes in 2027, its executive administrator says. Thanks in part to the rate and benefit changes previously approved, “we are not going to be...

By Ray Gronberg

December 2, 2025

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