MDNews - Greater Kansas

News From Around KUSM-WICHITA MATCH DAY ANNOUNCEMENT WAS LESS SOCIAL Until this year, Match Day announcements for fourth-year medical students to learn where they would be spending the next phase of their training were more social, celebratory events. Students across the na - tion would gather and learn — along with their classmates, family and friends — where they would head after graduation in May. This year's Match Day on Friday, March 20, came as most states had abandoned large gatherings because of novel coronavirus concerns. Instead, students received a letter at their home or an email announc - ing matches. Of the 67 students at the University of Kansas School of Medicine- Wichita who matched, 31 will stay in Kansas. The remaining 36 stu - dents will travel to 19 other states to continue their medical education, according to KUSM-Wichita officials. Thirty-one students will go into a primary care field (family medicine, internal medicine, pediatrics), eight to surgery, seven matched to obstetrics and gynecology, five to anesthesiology and five to emergency medicine residency programs. The National Resident Matching Program, a private, nonprofit organization founded in 1952, provides the methodology for pairing the students and their residencies. GENERAL SURGERY PHYSICIAN JOINS STORMONT VAIL HEALTH Amanda Loeffler, MD, has joined the Stormont Vail Health medical team and will practice as a general surgeon at Cotton O'Neil General Surgery, 823 S.W. Mulvane in Topeka. Dr. Loeffler received her medical degree at Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis in 2009. She completed her general surgery residency at the University of Kansas School of Medicine-Wichita in 2014. After residency, Dr. Loeffler practiced as a general surgeon at Beatrice Community Hospital & Health Center in Nebraska. SUMNER COMMUNITY HOSPITAL IN WELLINGTON ABRUPTLY CLOSES Around mid-March, Sumner Community Hospital in Wellington closed its doors, becoming the sixth rural Kansas hospital to shut down since 2010. According to a story in The Wichita Eagle, Wellington City Manager Shane Shields said the hospital had been facing financial difficulties that were in part caused by the state's lack of Medicaid expansion. Cindy West, the hospital's CEO, was quoted in The Topeka Capital- Journal as saying the shutdown happened in an orderly fashion to ensure patients were transferred to other care facilities. With about 75 employees, the hospital was among the largest employers in Wellington, a town of about 8,000. The 63-bed hospi - tal was being managed by Rural Hospital Group Consolidated LLC based in Kansas City, Missouri, which also operates the Hillsboro Community Hospital. Other rural Kansas hospitals that have closed in the past decade were the Central Kansas Medical Center in Great Bend, Horton Community Hospital, Mercy Hospital Fort Scott, Mercy Hospital Independence and Oswego Community Hospital, according to Becker's Hospital Review. The Horton and Oswego hospitals were among those operated by EmpowerHMS, a former hospital management company headquartered in North Kansas City whose financial difficulties in - cluded not paying wages and vendors. KANSAS CLINIC & OFFICER RESOLVE MEDICARE, TRICARE CLAIMS CASE WITH SETTLEMENT Trina Health-Wichita NW LLC and Jack West of Dallas, one of the company's principals, agreed to pay a $775,000 fine to resolve a false claims action brought by the federal government on behalf of Medicare and Tricare. The latter is the general healthcare system serving active duty and retired military and their families. According to a news release from the office of U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister, "the company submitted claims to the federal programs for what the company called 'artificial pancreas treatment' for diabetes. The United States alleged that from September 2015 through May 2017, Trina and West violated the False Claims Act because the claims were actually for an outpatient insulin infusion regimen that was not medically reasonable or necessary and specifically not covered by the federal programs." KANSAS HEALTH SCIENCE CENTER HAS NEW ACADEMIC LEADERSHIP The Kansas Health Science Center (KHSC) in Wichita, which is working to open Kansas' second medical school, has new academic leaders. Joel Dickerman, DO, is the center's new Dean and Chief Academic Officer; J. Michael Finley, DO, has been hired as the Senior Associate Dean. Both are licensed physicians and surgeons who earned their Doctor of Osteopathy degrees from the Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine. 2 0❱❱❱❱❱ H O S P I T A L R O U N D S

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