MHA Today | March 6, 2024

Staff Contact: Andrew Wheeler

Hospitals face a myriad of financial challenges and for many Missouri hospitals, the situation is dire. As MHA prepares its advocacy strategies to address the historic challenges threatening the financial viability of Missouri’s hospitals, we need your help.

The Hospital Industry Data Institute launched its newest service offering Hospital Performance Insights. This new offering will provide MHA timely data to strengthen its advocacy for the financial stability of member hospitals, as well as provide participants with dashboards that visualize fiscally focused peer benchmarking information in common groupings, such as gross revenue, discounts and expenses.

Instructions on how to participate were sent to hospital CEOs and CFOs in February. Success depends on maximum participation and is key to gaining a statewide perspective on hospitals’ fiscal viability. We recognize your teams are busy and appreciate your prioritization of participation in this important program.

Staff Contact: Andrew Wheeler

Change Healthcare is involved in a recent cybersecurity attack, causing delays in prior authorization determinations, claims filing and payment administration. HHS released a statement to inform affected parties about flexibilities in place to assist with timely payments to providers. The statement includes information from CMS related to changing clearinghouses, guidance for Medicare Advantage organizations and Medicaid managed care plans to remove or relax prior authorization processes, and assistance for providers who are having trouble filing claims.

Congratulations to Tim Bock, vice president of information technology, on five years of service!

Tim is responsible for delivering technology support services to MHA and HIDI. He leads and manages the teams that support IT infrastructure, enterprise services, technical support and security strategies.

During his tenure, Tim is especially proud of the work that the HIDI team accomplished in modernizing its cloud services platform and business intelligence offerings.

“MHA and HIDI are outstanding organizations with great staff who are focused on helping hospitals better treat our citizens and serve our communities.”

Tim is a proud husband and father of two children with one granddaughter and a grandson on the way. He also is an Army veteran with 32 years of service. His family enjoys traveling, live music, Chiefs football and enjoying life with loved ones.

Fun fact: Tim is a beekeeper and has had bees for more than a decade.