Doctor-investors could lose Ohio hospital privileges

The credentialing fight is seen as a test case on hospitals who shut out doctors involved with specialty hospitals.

By Katherine Vogt, AMNews staff. Jan. 12, 2004.

Physicians who invested in the newly opened New Albany Surgical Hospital near Columbus, Ohio, could soon lose their privileges at several area community hospitals.

The $40 million specialty orthopedic and neurological services inpatient facility opened for business on Dec. 1, 2003, prompting two area hospital systems to declare that they will stand by their policies that can preclude physician investors in such facilities from maintaining privileges at their hospitals.

None of the roughly 30 physician investors in New Albany lost privileges immediately at nearby hospitals. However, OhioHealth and Mount Carmel Health Systems said they were examining their policies and would consider taking action in coming months.

The plans have further polarized supporters and critics of specialty hospitals, which are promoted by some as efficient and streamlined for perfecting specific types of care and blasted by others as cherry-picking the best cases away from general hospitals. Those who favor specialty facilities say that if New Albany physician investors lose their privileges elsewhere, it will ultimately harm patients by denying them access to care at a full range of hospitals. They also say the community hospitals are engaging in economic credentialing, or granting privileges based on financial reasons rather than qualifications.

But community hospital supporters reject the idea that such policies constitute economic credentialing. They say the policies are necessary to prevent conflicts of interest among physicians who refer patients to hospitals in which they have an ownership interest as well as those in which they don't have a stake.