Southern California Hospital System Sues Kaiser Permanente for Managing Bills Rather Than Man...( CHINO Calif. Feb. 13 /- Prime Hea...),Health

CHINO, Calif., Feb. 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Prime Healthcare Services announced today that eight of its hospitals have filed lawsuits in four different Southern California counties against Kaiser Permanente seeking more than $25 Million for Kaiser's failure to properly pay thousands of claims for emergency medical services provided to Kaiser's HMO members. Under both federal and California law, each of these hospitals were required to provide medical screening examinations to each patient who sought emergency care and such further stabilizing care as was necessary to stabilize the patient's emergency medical condition regardless of the patient's insurance status. Kaiser, as well as other HMOs, is required to reimburse the hospitals for the reasonable and customary value of the emergency services provided. Although Prime Healthcare's hospitals provided emergency care to thousands of Kaiser's enrollees, Kaiser failed to properly reimburse Prime Healthcare's hospitals for the emergency services provided to its members. Instead, Kaiser has routinely denied claims in their entirety, paid only small portions of the claims, and/or reimbursed the hospitals at rates which are far below the reasonable and customary value of the emergency services. For example, Kaiser has failed to pay any portion of Sherman Oaks Hospital's $1.6 Million claim for emergency burn services provided to a critically-injured Kaiser member at the world-renowned Grossman Burn Center who was hospitalized for more than thirty days.

Given the rising costs of providing healthcare and the dramatic increase in the number of uninsured and underinsured patients, many hospitals have been forced to close, file bankruptcy, or limit services. Since 2001 more than 17 hospitals throughout Southern California have closed due to financial constraints and several others were forced to file bankruptcy. As noted by Roger Krissman, Chief Financial Officer of Prime Healthcare Services, "it is especially important
'/>"/>