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Andrew Bedi has been appointed COO of Doctors Hospital of Augusta (Ga.), part of Nashville, Tenn.-based HCA Healthcare.

He most recently served as CEO of Logan Memorial Hospital in Russellville, Ky., part of Louisville, Ky.-based ScionHealth, according to a July 15 hospital news release. 

Mr. Bedi previously spent nearly two decades at HCA Healthcare, including serving as COO of HCA’s TriStar Greenview Regional Hospital in Bowling Green, Ky., from 2014 to 2022. 

He first joined the system in 2002 as a lead financial analyst, according to his LinkedIn profile.
The post ScionHealth hospital CEO heads to HCA Georgia hospital appeared first on Becker’s Hospital Review | Healthcare News & Analysis.

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Now half way through the year, Detroit-based Henry Ford Health is still reaping the rewards of a financially sound fiscal 2024, after seeing a major leap in operating income last year, up to $294.2 million from $80.5 million in 2023.

Robin Damschroder, executive vice president, president of value-based enterprise and CFO of Henry Ford Health, said during a Becker’s CFO+Revenue Cycle Podcast episode that success can be attributed to early gains from the system’s joint venture with Ascension Michigan, strong performance from its Health Alliance Plan insurance arm and strategic cost containment. 

“First and foremost, we had some early wins in our joint venture with the Ascension Michigan facilities,” Ms. Damschroder said. “Those benefits came early. They were things from changing our group purchasing organization, so we got some rate wins on our contracts. For example, almost $35 million.”

Henry Ford Health launched its joint venture with Ascension Michigan on Oct. 1, 2024, bringing around 50,000 employees across more than 550 sites in Michigan under Henry Ford Health’s wing. 

As the joint venture integration continues, Ms. Damschroder said a key focus is merging five electronic medical record platforms into Henry Ford Health’s platform. 

“Collectively, we are working on about $250 million in what we call ‘tier-one synergies,” she said. “We have worked through integrating and getting to our shared governance set up. A lot of our focus originally … has been around cultural alignment. How can we gain quick operational efficiencies together and really getting some of those quick wins while we work at this larger technology transformation.”

Following the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, Ms. Damschroder said the system did a significant amount of scenario planning, and reviewed each initiative carefully. 

The legislation is expected to decrease Medicaid spending by nearly $1 trillion, with the number of uninsured individuals expected to increase by 11.8 million by 2034, according to the  Congressional Budget Office.

“When we look at it, the implications are a bit above the median of what we could have expected, but certainly not the worst-case scenario that was out there,” she said. “[Some] of these regulations, particularly when it comes to eligibility, work requirements and redetermination, the states are going to decide on sort of the final implementation rules. Michigan might experience something different than in Indiana or California or Texas. So we anticipate we might see some of those in 2026 and 2027 but the major, major cuts are expected to happen 2028 to 2032.”

Ms. Damschroder offered three pieces of leadership advice as healthcare leaders work to understand the legislation’s impact on their organizations.

“It’s about transparency and collaboration,” she said. You’ve got to prioritize open communication and cross functional teamwork at this time, followed by strategic investment. Even as we’re looking at cuts, we’re going to have to make key investments in order to get at the savings that we’re going to need to reduce our cost structures. Finally, we’ve got to adapt, right? We’ve got to adapt our structures. Sometimes it’s times like this, when you look at a crisis and see all the challenges, it really brings you opportunities that you haven’t been able to push past. I think we have the opportunity from a leadership perspective to step up.”
The post Henry Ford Health, Ascension Michigan’s JV going strong nearly 1 year in appeared first on Becker’s Hospital Review | Healthcare News & Analysis.

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If there’s one constant in healthcare cybersecurity, it’s change.

From the ever-evolving tactics to the Whack-a-Mole of hacker groups, health system cybersecurity leaders must remain vigilant to protect their organizations today while preparing for tomorrow’s threats.

“The key to planning the future of healthcare cybersecurity is to stay proactive, agile and constantly ahead of evolving threats,” Kristin Myers, executive vice president and chief digital officer of New Hyde Park, N.Y.-based Northwell Health, told Becker’s. “As tactics and threat actors continue to change, cybersecurity must be fully embedded into enterprise risk management, patient safety, and operational strategies.”

She recommends a “layered” defense approach, combining “zero trust,” network segmentation and AI-powered threat detection across EHRs, clinical systems and cloud platforms.

“Equally important is building a strong culture of cyber awareness through continuous education across the organization,” she said. “Long-term resilience requires people, process and technology to work together to defend against increasingly sophisticated attacks.”

Despite the ever-shifting cybersecurity landscape, “you absolutely can prepare,” said Erik Decker, vice president and chief information security officer of Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Health.

“A lot of the job is being ready to be responsive and reactive,” he said. “There are a couple of core principles that will persist no matter what the future holds, like having really good cyber hygiene such as MFA [multifactor authentication] for applications directly exposed to the internet.”

He said it’s about having a foundation in place and making sure it stays “whole without cracks,” identifying future threats through routine strategic planning sessions. Cybersecurity should also be part of health systems’ AI governance policies.

“The more attackers change their techniques, the more important it is to focus on fundamentals of both cybersecurity and overall digital excellence,” said David Heaney, chief information security officer of Somerville, Mass.-based Mass General Brigham.

That includes focusing on asset management, access controls, patching and end-user training, he said.

“Whether it’s the use of AI, a new specific technique, or something we’ve seen before, remaining relentlessly focused on our core actually allows us to pivot quickly to ensure our efforts have the greatest impact on our ability to defend against attacks and keep our patients safe,” he said.

Tremayne Smith, chief information security officer of Columbus-based Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, said preparing for the future of cybersecurity demands “vigilance and adaptability.” That includes a multilayered approach: continuous risk assessments, vulnerability management, and partnering with secure vendors who provide services like advanced threat detection and AI-powered defenses.

“We also recognize that our people are our strongest defense. We foster a culture of cybersecurity resilience through ongoing, comprehensive training for all staff, empowering them to identify and report suspicious activity,” Mr. Smith said. “We also maintain a rigorous incident response plan and robust data backup and disaster recovery protocols to ensure we can quickly and effectively address any potential breach, minimizing impact on patient care.”

Chris Stucker, deputy chief information security officer of Milwaukee-based Froedtert ThedaCare Health, said he and his team focus on the controllables.

“We don’t try to predict what the bad guys are going to do. We can’t control what they’re going to do. We can’t control their preparation. We can’t control their TTPs [tactics, techniques and procedures],” he said. “What we can control is how we prepare. So what we try to do is build systems that are resilient, that are adaptable. We try to build teams that are resilient and adaptable and empowered, teams that have the ability to react to whatever the adversary brings to us.”

Mr. Stucker, an Army veteran, also takes a military mindset to cybersecurity. He quoted Sun Tzu: “If you know yourself and you know your enemy, then you don’t need to fear the results of battles.”

“I know what my shiny things are, I know what my networks look like. I know what my segmentation does or doesn’t look like. I know what my gaps are. I know what my issues are. So now, if I were an enemy that knew that perfectly, how would I attack it?” he said. “And then we try to proactively put controls in place, build layered defenses, build in that segmentation at a network level, even at an identity level, that will make any attacker who comes to try to get our shiny stuff have to go through more defenses, make more noise, go slower, giving us more opportunity to see what they’re doing.”

With the increase of social engineering schemes, like fraudsters calling up IT help staff trying to ascertain log-ins and passwords, Froedtert ThedaCare Health provides help desks with technical tools and checklists to help validate employees, he said.

Cybersecurity leaders also need to stay abreast of geopolitical events and “hacktivists” who might try to target healthcare to further their agenda, Mr. Stucker said.

Wayman Cummings, vice president and chief information security officer of New Orleans-based Ochsner Health, compared his work to that of the physicians at his health system. 

“You use your telemetry data, just like you would for a patient,” he said. “We monitor the health of the network, we monitor the health of the systems, and we can identify when something is anomalous. A physician may see blood pressure going up and down in a patient. We see a particular type of traffic that’s coming through, and we know it’s associated with this type of attack model or this threat actor and that allows us to at least have an idea of what’s coming and get ahead of it.”

As large health systems have become more secure, hackers have turned their attention to smaller hospitals and health systems, said Brad Reimer, CIO of Sioux Falls, S.D.-based Sanford Health. So his health system works to extend cybersecurity help to rural facilities in its market, as many of them are linked to Sanford through Epic’s Community Connect program and other data-sharing programs.

Otherwise, Sanford Health focuses on continuous education of employees to keep them aware of the latest cyber threats and tactics. Email phishing is still the main way hackers try to gain access, but deepfakes are an increasing threat, with cybercriminals using AI to impersonate health system employees.

“They’re trying to find vulnerabilities in human judgment,” Mr. Reimer said. “So it’s not something where you can put a lot of technical controls in place. So we have been doing some intentional education around phishing and impersonation.”
The post How can health systems prepare for the future of cybersecurity? appeared first on Becker’s Hospital Review | Healthcare News & Analysis.

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The healthcare sector reported 283 data breaches in the first half of 2025, up from 236 during the same period in 2024, according to a July 16 report from the Identity Theft Resource Center.

Here are four things to know from the report:

The breaches affected 16,618,598 individuals, placing healthcare as the second-most compromised sector after financial services, which reported 387 incidents. Professional services, manufacturing and education followed.

Nationwide, 1,732 data breaches were reported from January through June, affecting 165,745,452 individuals. Of those, 1,348 resulted from cyberattacks, which remain the leading cause of breaches.

Yale New Haven (Conn.) Health reported one of the highest victim counts in healthcare, with 5,556,702 individuals affected. Other major breaches by victim count included Episource (5,418,866) and Blue Shield of California (4,700,000).

Nearly 70% of all breach notices — 1,191 out of 1,732 — did not disclose the cause of the incident.

The post Healthcare data breaches jump 20% in 2025: Report appeared first on Becker’s Hospital Review | Healthcare News & Analysis.

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As cancer care innovation and advancement continues to accelerate, health systems are expanding cancer services to meet patient needs and expectations. 

Here are four systems that recently announced plans to invest millions to build cancer hospitals, and two systems that recently opened cancer care facilities:

Indianapolis-based Indiana University Health is expected to begin construction on a cancer center in 2026 as part of a larger $214 million community growth project. The center will be located on the system’s Arnett Hospital campus in Lafayette, Ind.

Chicago-based Northwestern Memorial Hospital is seeking state approval to build a new tower with the aim of consolidating oncology services, which are currently housed in five buildings across the hospital’s downtown Chicago campus.The new facility would include an oncology triage center, operating rooms, infusion and diagnostic imaging services.

Boston-based Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians are proceeding with plans to build a $1.68 billion cancer hospital. The organizations have completed the necessary multi-agency, state and city approval process and are expected to begin construction on the facility in 2026.Dana-Farber’s existing oncology partnership with Brigham and Women’s Hospital is set to end in 2028. The new hospital is expected to open in 2031.

Mayo Clinic Jacksonville (Fla.) opened a $320 million cancer center in June, which will house the first carbon ion therapy program in the U.S. The system plans to add proton therapy in 2027 and carbon ion therapy in 2028.

In May, West Orange, N.J.-based RWJBarnabas Health and New Brunswick, N.J.-based Rutgers Cancer Institute opened the Jack & Sheryl Morris Cancer Center — the first freestanding cancer hospital in New Jersey.Steven Libutti, MD, senior vice president of oncology services for RWJBarnabas Health and director of the Rutgers Cancer Institute, told Becker’s the center will be a new “center of gravity” for both cancer care and research in the state.

Through a $150 million gift from the Kinder Foundation, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center and Texas Children’s Hospital, both based in Houston, have committed to building the largest pediatric cancer center in the U.S.Once built, the facility will offer inpatient and ambulatory care alongside research labs dedicated to drug discovery and clinical trials. The new center will be connected via a skybridge to Texas Children’s Hospital.Though the organizations have different academic homes, Richard Gorlick, MD, told Becker’s the partnership was “synergistic.”“Through the joint venture, we can create efficiencies by not having duplication, by having a large breadth of patients when conducting clinical trials and having additional expertise in different clinical areas,” he said. Texas Children’s and MD Anderson will begin collaborating on clinical operations and patient care in early 2026.

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President Donald Trump said he will most likely impose tariffs on pharmaceuticals as soon as the end of the month, along with tariffs on semiconductors, Bloomberg reported July 15. 

Here are four notes: 

President Trump said the additional tariffs could hit along with broader additional rates set for August 1. “Probably at the end of the month, we’re going to start off with a low tariff and give the pharmaceutical companies a year or so to build, and then we/re going to make it a very high tariff,” he told reporters July 15.

At a cabinet meeting in early July, President Trump announced plans to impose a 50% tariff on copper and suggested that pharmaceutical tariffs could reach 200% within a year unless companies bring manufacturing back to the U.S. He also invoked investigations under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, citing national security threats due to a flood of imports.

This comes after President Trump sent letters to trading partners dictating new import duties while maintaining a willingness to negotiate. One negotiation with Indonesia resulted in a revised tariff rate of 19%, down from 32% in exchange for commitments to buy $15 billion in U.S. energy and $4.5 billion in agriculturale products.

Smaller nations that did not receive custom tariff rates from the Trump administration will face a flat tariff of 10%, while other trading partners, such as the European Union, face a much higher levy of 30%.

The post Trump threatens pharma tariffs this month: 4 notes appeared first on Becker’s Hospital Review | Healthcare News & Analysis.

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Hartford (Conn.) Healthcare will receive the American Hospital Association’s 2025 Quest for Quality Prize during the upcoming AHA Leadership Summit in Nashville.

The Quest for Quality Prize honors organizations that have shown innovation in improving care quality, according to a July 15 news release from the AHA.

“Hartford Healthcare has successfully embedded a culture of continuous improvement at every level of the organization,” the release said. The system reported a 70% reduction in healthcare-acquired infections between 2015 and 2023 and a 48% increase in potential safety events flagged by team members between 2021 and 2023.

Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health was named a finalist for the award. The system was recognized for the eight-step process it uses to “cascade changes” across its hospitals, which has elevated 20 of the system’s performance metrics to “the top third or better of the national median.”Read the full release here.
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Memphis, Tenn.-based Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare will discontinue a service and reduce the size of its workforce as part of a restructuring plan.

In a news release shared with Becker’s, the six-hospital health system said the changes follow careful analysis of operations and current patient volumes.

“These changes align with our goal of maintaining long-term strength and high-quality services,” Executive Vice President and COO Monica Wharton said in the release.

As part of the changes, Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare will consolidate labor and delivery services currently provided at Methodist South Hospital in Memphis with those at Methodist Le Bonheur Germantown (Tenn.) Hospital and Methodist Olive Branch (Miss.) Hospital, effective Aug. 1.

The health system cited a consistent decline in birth volumes in the Methodist South service area, including a 43% drop in deliveries over the past five years, as contributing factors in the decision. Methodist South’s emergency department will continue to care for patients with obstetrics-related emergency care needs.

Also, as part of the organization’s realignment, Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare is cutting about 161 jobs, which will affect about 1% of its 12,000-person workforce. 

The health system said 80 affected employees are expected to find new roles within Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare, and that those who do not will be offered severance pay and career transition support. The organization also noted that the layoffs have been implemented at various system locations “based on the specific needs of that location and the community it serves.”

All of the changes are part of the system’s PATH (Planning, Alignment, Transformational and High Performance) Forward plan.

“As part of our mission to serve the entire community, we regularly examine our service offerings and processes to ensure that they align with community needs and follow best clinical practices in a rapidly changing healthcare environment,” Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare President and CEO Michael Ugwueke, DHA, said in the release. “Our PATH Forward reaffirms our commitment to the Memphis area.”
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A 63-year-old man has been arrested in connection with death threats made against the CEO of Tampa (Fla.) General Hospital.

Lawrence Brunn of Oakmont, Pa., has been charged with cyber harassment and could face up to five years in federal prison if convicted, according to a July 15 news release from the U.S. attorney’s office for the Middle District of Florida. The release refers to the CEO as “J.C.”; the case is regarding John Couris, who has served as president and CEO since 2017, the health system confirmed to Becker’s.

Mr. Brunn began harassing the CEO in 2023, with threats increasing in frequency and intensity, according to an unsealed complaint. The threats called for the CEO’s execution, according to court documents.

In addition to online posts, Mr. Brunn sent mail to Mr. Couris’ private residence, his neighbors’ homes, and those of Tampa General Hospital board members, according to the U.S. attorney’s office.

“This is an ongoing investigation,” Tampa General Hospital said in a statement shared with Becker’s July 16. “We have full faith in the US Attorney General’s office, and we will continue to cooperate. We want to thank local and federal law enforcement authorities for their intervention.”

Tampa General’s CEO previously served as president and CEO of Jupiter (Fla.) Medical Center from 2010 to 2017, where he worked with Mr. Brunn, according to the complaint obtained by Becker’s. The CEO terminated Mr. Brunn’s employment after he falsely accused the hospital’s CFO of embezzlement, the complaint states.

The complaint is an arrest warrant alleging the defendant has violated federal criminal law. The case is being investigated by the FBI, the release said.
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The FDA is reevaluating GlaxoSmithKline’s blood cancer drug Blenrep following mixed results from two phase 3 trials and mounting concerns about eye-related side effects and dosing. 

The agency is meeting with its Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee July 17 to discuss whether the drug’s proposed doses are appropriate given the high rates of ocular toxicity seen in the clinical trials, according to a briefing document. The studies tested Blenrep in combination with standard therapies for relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma. 

Though Blenrep combinations improved progression-free survival for multiple myeloma patients, more than 75% of patients experienced severe eye toxicity, including blurred vision and corneal damage. 

The panel will weigh whether revised dosing schedules could improve safety without compromising efficacy. 
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