Former Kettering Health board member calls for better oversight and more transparency as health network faces allegations

Former Kettering Health board member calls for better oversight and more transparency as health network faces allegations

Former Kettering Health board member Phil Parker called for the health network to be more transparent with the public and for the board of directors to improve oversight in the wake of allegations of extravagant spending and abuse of charitable funds by hospital system officials.

“There’s going to have to be trust rebuilt in the system,” said Parker, who left the Kettering Health board of directors in the summer of 2022 at the end of his second term after six years on the board. He remains on the boards overseeing the network’s Soin Medical Center and Kettering Health Greene Memorial and retired in 2020 after 26 years as president and CEO of the Dayton Area Chamber of Commerce.

“Once we determine the issues and any of the recommendations to improve our governing structure it would be my hope that we would share that with not only the board and the employees, but also our community.”

Parker spoke exclusively to the Dayton Daily News about the allegations and the health network’s internal investigation.

Crisis management experts agreed with Parker that Kettering Health must communicate clearly with the public, patients, employees, donors and other stakeholders to rebuild trust.

“The thing you have to provide first and foremost is transparency,” said Lanier Holt, associate professor in the school of communication at Ohio State University. “If you’re transparent and open, people will be more inclined to believe you than to distrust you. Once they distrust you it’s almost impossible to get that trust back. They need to get out in front of this and tell the story.”

Kettering Health has refused to comment beyond a March 27 written statement that was the first public indication from the health system, operated by the non-profit Kettering Adventist Healthcare, that allegations had been made and an internal investigation was launched.

Kettering Health operates 15 medical centers and more than 120 outpatient locations throughout southwestern Ohio, as well as Kettering Health Medical Group, which includes more than 700 board-certified providers.

A complaint filed with Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost in February alleged improper spending by former CEO Fred Manchur, former Kettering Health Board Chair Dave Weigley and others. The allegations, made anonymously, involve spending on travel, automobiles and renovations to Manchur’s Kettering home.

Yost also received a complaint in August from former Kettering Health employee Lori Van Nostrand regarding Manchur’s expense reports, entertainment costs and decisions on buying property, among other issues.

Allegations of financial and administrative impropriety and nepotism were included in a 2021 anonymous letter signed “Concerned SDA Church Members and Friends of Kettering Health” and addressed to health network associates, Seventh-day Adventist Church officials and government officials.

Confidentiality rules prohibit the attorney general, who oversees charitable organizations, from confirming or denying the existence of an investigation, said Kelly May, spokeswoman for Yost.

Manchur retired Dec. 31, two months after Kettering Health announced he was taking a leave of absence before retiring. He did not respond to requests for comment.

Weigley stepped down as long-time board

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Health care University of South Carolina joins forces with Butterfly Network to transform affected person care, health education and learning and professional medical investigation | MUSC

Health care University of South Carolina joins forces with Butterfly Network to transform affected person care, health education and learning and professional medical investigation | MUSC

Butterfly Blueprint™ to empower MUSC clinicians, students, and researchers to redefine how AI-driven, handheld ultrasound can be made use of in modern techniques to gain individuals at the position-of-treatment

 

GUILFORD, CT., NEW YORK and CHARLESTON, S.C. (Might 24, 2022) Butterfly Network, Inc. (NYSE: BFLY), a digital wellbeing firm reworking treatment with handheld, total-human body ultrasound, and The Clinical College of South Carolina (MUSC) declared these days that MUSC will leverage Butterfly Blueprint,™ the company’s technique-wide ultrasound platform. Jointly with Butterfly, MUSC aims to renovate affected individual care, well being instruction and health-related research by empowering its clinicians, learners and researchers with point-of-treatment access to AI-run, handheld ultrasound. 

“At MUSC, we strive to remain on the front-end of innovation to progress how we educate and prepare health and fitness care companies and serve the persons of South Carolina,” mentioned Patrick Cawley, M.D., MUSC Well being CEO and executive vice president of Overall health Affairs, University. “With Butterfly’s technological know-how, we’re empowering care teams to know additional about what’s likely on with a patient quicker by swiftly and effortlessly getting visibility inside of the overall body so they can make a lot more knowledgeable care choices. We’re excited to carry this sort of an evolved place-of-care ultrasound device to our well being procedure. We consider it will have large impact throughout all treatment configurations and in particular in our rural and underserved options, exactly where access to experts and imaging can be quite hard for some patients to deal with or pay for.”

As the world’s to start with and only full-human body Ultrasound-On-Chip™ technological know-how able of turning a compatible smartphone or pill into an imaging device, Butterfly enables the realistic software of ultrasound details into the clinical workflow of all well being treatment practitioners. Butterfly enables graphic acquisition and interpretation of distinctive regions of the human body and can be utilized for things like automated bladder volume calculations with 3D visualizations and to simplicity and information central line placement and injections. The system matches in a health care professional’s pocket and is driven by a unique mix of cloud-connected software and hardware technologies, simply accessed through a cellular application.

MUSC government vice president for Educational Affairs and provost Lisa K. Saladin, PT, PhD, agreed, incorporating: “It is significant that we provide our students opportunities to teach with advanced systems that they will be making use of to assess and deal with people equally for the duration of their clinical rotations as students and following graduation as wellbeing treatment providers. We are energized about this collaboration and the prospects it will supply for our students.”

MUSC will start out its Butterfly rollout initially concentrating on practitioners and clinicians at MUSC Overall health Florence Health care Middle, MUSC Well being Marion Healthcare Center and at the No. 1 hospital in South Carolina as named by U.S. Information & Planet Report, Charleston-based University Healthcare Heart. A main component of the affiliation will be defining new types of treatment in rural configurations with

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Auburn guy named CEO of world-wide dental lab network | Company

Auburn guy named CEO of world-wide dental lab network | Company

An Auburn resident is the new chief of a global dental laboratory network.

Leixir Dental Team announced that its board of directors named Christian LeBrun as its main government officer as of Jan. 17. LeBrun has an extensive profession in the dental industry, such as the earlier 15 years at Aspen Dental running lab operations and building technologies. He has also labored as a manager at Seneca Falls-dependent BonaDent Dental Laboratories.

Leixir is a community of total-services dental laboratories with spots through the United States, Canada, Australia and India. LeBrun can take over for corporation founder Harmeet Bindra, who remains as govt chairman. He started Leixir in 2013.

“We are extremely energized to welcome Christian to guide Leixir in its upcoming chapter of development,” mentioned Marshall Griffin, a member of Leixir’s board and a principal of Comvest Partners, a non-public expenditure firm, in a press release. “A seasoned DSO government who began his vocation as a educated dental technician, Christian provides a exceptional viewpoint and talent established. His vast-ranging abilities will aid Leixir increase its relationships with dentists, the two in private apply and in DSOs, generate continued excellence in lab functions, and further improve its abilities in electronic dentistry.”

Bindra assisted guide the CEO research.

“I by now have the fantastic fortune of a robust, long-standing partnership with Christian by way of his function at Aspen Dental,” he explained in the push launch. “Christian is a great healthy for Leixir. He embraces the ethos of support, innovation and interactions on which this enterprise was started. His strong efficiency document, coupled with his eager knowledge of lab operations and the requires and priorities of professionals and dentists, make him uniquely qualified to acquire this firm effectively into the long term. I am delighted to welcome him to Leixir.”

The firm reported LeBrun will be based mostly in Leixir’s Tampa locale. At Aspen, LeBrun most not too long ago served as vice president of prosthetics, lab infrastructure and new engineering. Leixir mentioned he performed a vital role in Aspen’s advancement from 50 to 900 places.

“I am thrilled and honored to provide as the next CEO of Leixir,” LeBrun said in the launch. “With the dental environment rapidly transferring towards electronic dentistry, Leixir is a technological chief very well-positioned for powerful ongoing advancement. I appear ahead to creating on the basis of product or service innovation and services created by Harmeet and Leixir’s proficient personnel.”

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Study reveals ‘extensive network’ of industry ties with healthcare

Study reveals ‘extensive network’ of industry ties with healthcare
healthcare
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

The medical product industry maintains an extensive network of financial and non-financial ties with all major healthcare parties and activities, reveals a study published by The BMJ today.

This network seems to be mostly unregulated and opaque, and the researchers call for enhanced oversight and transparency “to shield patient care from commercial influence and to preserve public trust in healthcare.”

Although the medical product industry is a critical partner in advancing healthcare, particularly in developing new tests and treatments, their main objective is to ensure financial returns to shareholders.

In an influential 2009 report, the Institute of Medicine described a multifaceted healthcare ecosystem rife with industry influence.

Yet most studies of conflict of interests related to pharmaceutical, medical device, and biotechnology companies have focused on a single party (eg. healthcare professionals, hospitals, or journals) or a single activity (eg. research, education, or clinical care). The full extent of industry ties across the healthcare ecosystem is therefore still uncertain.

To address this gap, a team of US researchers set out to identify all known ties between the medical product industry and the healthcare ecosystem.

They searched the medical literature for evidence of ties between pharmaceutical, medical device, and biotechnology companies and parties (including hospitals, prescribers and professional societies) and activities (including research, health professional education and guideline development) in the healthcare ecosystem.

Data in 538 articles from 37 countries, along with expert input, was used to create a map depicting these ties. These ties were then verified, cataloged, and characterized to ascertain types of industry ties (financial, non-financial), applicable policies on conflict of interests, and publicly available data sources.

The results show an extensive network of medical product industry ties—often unregulated and non-transparent—to all major activities and parties in the healthcare ecosystem.

Key activities include research, healthcare education, guideline development, formulary selection (prescription drugs that are covered by a health plan or stocked by a healthcare facility), and clinical care.

Parties include non-profit entities (eg. foundations and advocacy groups), the healthcare profession, the market supply chain (eg. payers, purchasing and distribution agents), and government.

For example, the researchers describe how opioid manufacturers provided funding and other assets to prescribers, patients, public officials, advocacy organizations, and other healthcare parties, who, in turn, pressured regulators and public health agencies to quash or undermine opioid related guidelines and regulations.

And they warn that many other examples of harm from industry promoted products remain unexplored.

The results show that all party types have financial ties to medical product companies, with only payers and distribution agents lacking additional, non-financial ties.

They also show that policies for conflict of interests exist for some financial and a few non-financial ties, but publicly available data sources seldom describe or quantify these ties.

The researchers acknowledge that their findings are limited to known or documented industry ties, and that some data might have been missed. However, they say their strategy of systematic, duplicative searching and feedback from an international panel of experts is unlikely to have

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