Katie Adams is a senior reporter for MedCity News covering providers and healthcare technology. Previously, she worked as a healthcare technology editor at Becker’s Hospital Review. Her journalism degree is from DePaul University in Chicago, where she is still based.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katie-adams-450775141/
Sanford Health signed a deal to acquire North Memorial Health, which could be its long-sought entry into the Twin Cities market. The move is the latest in a series of expansion efforts for the South Dakota-based health system.
Beth Israel Lahey Health said modernizing its fax infrastructure during a major Epic EHR consolidation helped the health system slash fax failure rates from 34% to 4% and save $4 million. By adopting Retarus’ cloud-based platform, the health system simplified referrals and prescription processing, as well as reduced manual administrative work.
Discover the top AI-powered EAP providers for 2026. Compare platforms like Kyan Health and Spring Health on triage speed, global reach, and clinical quality to transform workforce wellbeing.
The Department of Justice’s new “West Coast” strike force targets Arizona, Nevada and Northern California — regions flagged for rising Medicaid, hospice and tech-enabled fraud risks. Legal experts say the effort signals a broader shift toward data-driven enforcement, as regulators ramp up their scrutiny of telehealth companies and billing automation software.
Pennsylvania sued Character.ai, alleging one of the startup’s AI chatbots illegally practiced medicine by posing as a licensed psychiatrist. The case marks the second state lawsuit against the startup and highlights growing regulatory scrutiny of AI chatbot platforms and their safety guardrails.
A new report from Gibbins Advisors showed that healthcare bankruptcy filings rose 33% in the first quarter of 2026, driven mostly by outpatient and senior care providers. At the same time, hospital M&A activity rebounded to its strongest first quarter since early 2020.
Lawmakers are applying increased scrutiny to private equity’s involvement in healthcare, particularly when it comes to physician practice roll-ups. But investor Matthew Bennett argues the pressure is reshaping rather than shrinking the sector, pushing firms away from roll-ups and toward strategies focused on improving outcomes and using technology to boost efficiency.
Small practices play a critical role in healthcare delivery, but they cannot continue to absorb ever-increasing administrative demands without consequences.
Disagreements between providers and payers have been moving into the courtroom over the past few weeks. The California Hospital Association sued Anthem over one of its out-of-network policies, Broward Health sued Florida Blue over alleged underpayment, and Jefferson Health sued Aetna over a Medicare Advantage hospital stay rule.
A proposed merger between Atrium Health and WakeMed Health is facing an early delay, with county commissioners having postponed a key vote over transparency concerns. State officials are warning the deal could hurt competition and drive up healthcare costs in the Raleigh area.
A Massachusetts regulator is warning that CVS and Mass General Brigham’s proposed MinuteClinic partnership could drive up healthcare spending by at least $40 million annually, largely through steering patients into a higher-priced system. Experts said the deal might improve convenience for some patients but is unlikely to meaningfully expand access — and could ultimately strengthen market power and push costs even higher.
Roon is a new physician-only social network. The platform — founded by a neurosurgeon and two former Pinterest executives — aims to surface the “collective wisdom” of doctors that currently lives in informal exchanges and fragmented online communities.
By reducing administrative burden and redesigning workflows around human needs, it creates space for what matters most: connection between clinicians and patients.
April has seen a slew of executive hires, promotions and layoffs across the healthcare industry. For instance, Aledade, Humana and Zimmer Biomet named new executives. There were also layoffs at organizations including Baylor Scott & White Health Plan, Novo Nordisk and UnityPoint Health.
The first major update to HIPAA in more than a decade will eliminate the distinction between “required” and “addressable” safeguards, making key cybersecurity and physical security measures mandatory for all healthcare providers. This shift will expose gaps in hospitals’ fragmented security systems, though, according to Kumar Sokka, CEO of cybersecurity platform Acre Security.
Medtronic suffered a cyberattack on its corporate IT systems. The incident highlights growing cybersecurity risks in the medtech sector, with cybergangs increasingly using phishing and other human-engineering tactics to gain access to data.
Nvidia and Hoppr are betting that healthcare AI will scale not through standalone applications, but through a new infrastructure layer that lets providers develop and deploy their own imaging models.
Midstream Health is taking a bit of a different approach to healthcare AI by focusing on reducing hospitals’ costs rather than boosting their revenue. The startup uses AI to identify savings opportunities across fragmented spending data, which helps health systems like Mount Sinai and CommonSpirit quickly improve their purchasing decisions.