ASCENSION

ThedaCare said in a complaint that Ascension had "poached" the hospital's workers as the region struggles amid a rise in COVID-19 cases.

SAGINAW, MI — Ascension plans to invest $125 million into its hospitals in Saginaw, Standish and Tawas City. Ascension officials have announced a plan to invest $125 million in operational capital into the health system’s northern Michigan health ministries, which includes Ascension St. Mary’s Hospital in Saginaw, Ascension Standish Hospital in Standish and Ascension St. Joseph Hospital in Tawas City. We will be here for generations to come.”Ascension is a faith-based health care organization that has served Michigan for more than 140 years. Ascension operates 16 hospitals and hundreds of related health care facilities across the state, employing more than 23,000 people in Michigan. In fiscal year 2020, Ascension provided more than $311 million in community benefit and care of people living in poverty in Michigan.

MOUNT PLEASANT, MI - A new partnership agreement between Ascension Michigan and Central Michigan University’s College of Medicine will have CMU students learn and train at three of the system’s hospitals for the next 25 years. While residents have trained at Ascension St. Mary’s Hospital in Saginaw for decades, the agreement will give CMU medical students in their third or fourth years opportunities for clinical rotations at Ascension Genesys Hospital in Grand Blanc and Ascension St. John Hospital in Detroit as well, according to the release. “We are very proud to have solidified this agreement with CMU College of Medicine,” Ascension Michigan Chief Medical Officer Charles Husson said in a news release. More than 60% of 2021 graduates entered primary care residencies and almost half stayed in Michigan, according to the release. “We have partnered well through the years to create a high-quality education and training environment for medical students as well as residents,” Duggan said in the release.

Based on its investigation, the department determined that Ascension automatically requested that its non-U.S. citizen employees present new documents to prove their continued work authorization, even in situations where it was not required. Ascension utilized a customized employment eligibility verification software program to electronically complete the Form I-9 and track the expiration dates of non-U.S. citizen employee documents. These non-U.S. citizen employees often presented documents that did not require reverification of employment eligibility. In some instances after sending these e-mails, Ascension further required non-U.S. citizen employees to present new documents in order to continue working. The INA’s anti-discrimination provision prohibits employers from requesting more or different documents than necessary to prove work authorization based on employees’ citizenship, immigration status, or national origin.

A Michigan health care provider has agreed to pay $2.8 million to the federal government to settle allegations that a doctor performed unnecessary hysterectomies and other services.

GRAND RAPIDS, MI — Spectrum Health, a Grand Rapids-based health system with 31,000 employees and 14 hospitals, says it will require all staff, volunteers and contractors to take the COVID-19 vaccine. “As a mission-driven organization, we are here to improve health, inspire hope and save lives,” Spectrum Health President and CEO Tina Freese Decker said in a statement. The health system says the mandate will go into effect eight weeks after the Food and Drug Administration grants full approval to the COVID-19 vaccine. We encourage people to be vaccinated, in consultation with their physician’s advice.”Freese Decker said requiring the COVID-19 vaccine is similar to prior decisions made by Spectrum to mandate the flu vaccine. “We are applying the same logic to the COVID-19 vaccine as we did in requiring the flu and other vaccines.

SAGINAW, MI - Middle and high school athletes will get a chance to get their sports physicals taken care of for free in Saginaw. The physicals will be performed by the medical team of sports medicine physicians, orthopedic sports surgeons, physical therapists, athletic trainers and Central Michigan University family medicine residents, according to a press release from Ascension. Sports physicals are expected to take 15 minutes while physicals done with a concussions baseline test will take approximately 30 minutes, said the press release. According to Ascension, baseline assessments allow for comparison of post-injury state to baseline parameters for accurate diagnosis and proper return to play protocol. Each student will need to bring a completed Michigan High School Athletic Association medical history/consent form and baseline consent form signed appropriately by a parent or guardian.

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SAGINAW, MI - The Ascension Michigan health system is taking steps in its mid-Michigan facilities to reduce the spread of the COVID-19 virus by tightening its visitor restrictions. The Saginaw, Tawas and Standish locations all were previously operating at what Ascension defined as a ‘Tier III’ visitation level, which allowed one designated visitor per patient for the duration of the patient’s visit/admission. Now all three facilities are under ‘Tier IV’, which is the cause for the ‘no visitor’ policy. A visitor is defined by Ascension as one person for the duration of a patient’s episode of care. All visitors must stay in the patient room or designated area, and limit visiting other areas in the hospital.

DETROIT – Michigan State Police opened an investigation into a shooting on I-94 Christmas night. According to authorities, a 47-year-old man drove himself to Ascension St. John Hospital on Moross Road, where he is being treated for a gunshot wound. Police said the man told staff in the emergency department of the hospital that he had been shot while on the eastbound lanes of I-94. His vehicle was towed to a Michigan State Police post for processing. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Michigan State Police at 734-287-5000.

SAGINAW, MI - Ten staff members of Ascension St. Mary’s Hospital in Saginaw rolled up their sleeves in a special ceremony Wednesday to receive the hospital’s first doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. Ascension St. Mary’s received the newly approved Moderna vaccine the morning of Wednesday, Dec. 23. Both the new Moderna vaccine and the Pfizer shot require two doses several weeks apart. The occasion was festive, with some Ascension staff members decked out in holiday themed gear. Once a bit skeptical before getting the vaccine, she took to heart what an infection control nurse at Ascension told her.

Among the first Michiganders to receive Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine were 10 health care workers at Ascension Providence Hospital on Wednesday morning. Patel was one of the 10 frontline workers who received the COVID vaccine Wednesday morning. Though the hospital received nearly 2,000 doses Wednesday morning, Ascension officials say only 10 employees were vaccinated because they are taking their time with the vaccine rollout to ensure everything goes smoothly. “There’s just enough nuances to this that we want to ensure that we’re being very thoughtful and going through all of our processes,” said Ascension Michigan Vice President of Operations Excellence, Tammy Merkel. Michigan officials believe that enough doses will be available by the spring of 2021 for all eligible individuals to receive the vaccine.

PORTAGE, Mich. – With the shipments of the Pfizer vaccine out of Portage on the way, Michigan’s essential workers -- especially those in the food industry -- are hoping they will be next in line after medical workers to be vaccinated. For months, workers in grocery stores and the food industry have been subjected to some of the worst outbreaks during the pandemic. essential workers are urging they should be next -- as stores continue to fill with holiday shoppers. Michigan’s covid outbreak tracker shows the food industry and retail shops account for nearly 40 current outbreaks statewide. They are still part of the first wave with hundreds of thousands of other workers in essential industries all looking to get vaccinated.

Michigan healthcare officials will start distributing the vaccine to frontline workers. Ascension Hospital in Warren and five hospitals in the Henry Ford Health System will be able to store the vaccines in super cold freezers once they arrive. Henry Ford Health System CCO Dr. Adnan Munkarah said the they will be storing the vaccines at its hospitals in Detroit, Wyandotte, Macomb, West Bloomfield and Jackson. They have about 11,000 frontline workers who need vaccines, so a lottery system was set up and the first 1,000 workers know who they are. Frontline workers are asking for all the help they can get to keep that number down.

PORTAGE, Mich. – The shipments of the Pfizer vaccine out of Portage set in motion the largest vaccination effort in American history. Nearly 3 million doses of the vaccine will be delivered to all 50 states. In Metro Detroit, that includes Ascension Hospital in Warren and Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, which is expecting just under 1,000 initial doses. Beaumont Health is estimating they’ll get about 1,000 doses in the first batch before moving up to about 14,000 Pfizer vaccines as production kicks into high-gear. They have about 11,000 frontline workers who need vaccines, so a lottery system was set up and the first 1,000 workers know who they are.

ROCHESTER HILLS, Mich. – Fire crews were dispatched Thursday morning to Ascension Providence Rochester Hospital on reports of a fire. According to authorities, the call came in at about 8:45 a.m. and when fire crews arrived, they found smoke coming from the second floor of the building. Authorities said the hospital’s sprinkler system held the fire back until fire crews were able to extinguish the fire. Rochester Hills Fire Department had help from fire crews from Waterford, Bloomfield Township, Troy, Oakland Township and Auburn Hills. The fire investigation will be handled by the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office.

All rights reserved)WARREN, Mich. – Ascension Michigan has issued temporary visitation restrictions to help prevent the spread of coronavirus as cases surge throughout the state. One visitor is allowed for outpatient surgery and must stay in the waiting room. The above restrictions do not apply at Ascension Michigan physician practice sites. A number of other medical centers have also recently ramped up visitation restrictions as COVID-19 cases climb throughout Michigan. The total number of coronavirus cases in Michigan has risen to 277,806, including 8,190 deaths, as of Wednesday.

All rights reserved)DETROIT – Ascension Michigan is partnering with the Detroit Health Department to offer free immunization and flu shots to children this weekend. Officials say vaccinations among children in Detroit have declined from 82% to 47% since March, according to a report from the Wayne County Health Department. To combat this decline, the health system will host a Back to School Community Immunization Fair on September 12 at Martin Luther King Jr. High School. From 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., children 6 months old and older can receive free immunization and flu shots. Officials say individuals are welcome whether they are insured or not.

Thomas Kurian, CEO of Google Cloud and formerly president of product development at Oracle, speaks at the Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco on Oct. 3, 2017. Google Cloud, which aims to compete with Amazon and Microsoft, has the potential to pick up some of the slack despite trailing well behind the two industry leaders. Health care is a particularly attractive sector, as there are still large accounts to be won. But being unable to address privacy concerns could sink these ambitions, as no health customer wants to face angry consumers concerned about Google getting their health data. "And if it didn't happen, health care would grind to a screeching halt."

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, speaks to the media before the opening of the Berlin representation of Google Germany in Berlin on January 22, 2019. The deal was first disclosed by a Wall Street Journal piece, which explained that 150 Google employees already have access to data on tens of millions of patients without their knowledge or consent. However, it's not clear that the deal represents a major privacy risk. These people asked for anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the deal with the media. On the Google side, the goal was to develop tools to make it easier for doctors to pull up specific patient data in a medical record.

A recently revealed deal between Google and hospital network Ascension is already sparking privacy concerns in Congress. Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Democratic presidential candidate, shared privacy concerns Tuesday on how the companies are sharing private patient health data. CNBC reported earlier Wednesday that the privacy concerns may not be as straightforward as they could appear on face value. "This collaboration isn't the only one that raises serious privacy concerns," Klobuchar said in a statement. The bill would require the Department of Health and Human Services to help the Federal Trade Commission establish "meaningful regulations that protect private health data not covered under existing privacy law."