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By subscribing to Laboratory Industry Report, each month you'll get an insider's view of the lab industry's most important business and financial trends, plus predictions for the coming year.
In each issue, you find:
- Comparative data on lab pricing
- Information and explanations describing how to deal with healthcare integration, capitation, technology advances, etc.
- Clear perspectives of how your firm is performing vs. the market at large How publicly-traded lab companies are performing and what their top executives earn
- Updates on late-breaking mergers & acquisitions.
Are you up on what's working—and what's not—for laboratories located in a variety of practice settings-hospital, commercial, group practice sites and network systems?
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Laboratory Industry Report is a must for everyone having a vital stake in today's competitive lab marketplace-owner, director, pathologist, CEO, COO, CFO, general manager, administrator, manager, marketeer, or vendor.
With Laboratory Industry Report, you'll get all the business news & insights which are accurate, objective, reliable, and authoritative. Gain a competitive edge for your company or institution today by subscribing today!
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 | LIR March 2008 (full PDF issue) |
| TOP OF THE NEWS
Lab contracts now stabilized
Quest, LabCorp release ’07 revenues
PERSPECTIVE
Physicians’ lab complaints
LAB DATA ANALYSIS
Benchmarking ’07 data for the nat’l labs
INSIDE THE LAB INDUSTRY
Now is the time for labs to strategize
COMPETITIVE BIDDING UPDATE
San Diego labs eye injunction
THE MARKET ABROAD
Australia’s pathology market in flux
SALES & MARKETING
Q&A with expert on lab sales strategies
FINANCIAL
Lab index down 7%
INDUSTRY BUZZ
NY attorney general pursues UnitedHealth suit
Full Article |
| Quest Projects 9% Growth in 2008 Revenues, LabCorp Sees 13% |
| The two major national labs revealed their 2008 outlook and 2007 results in February, with Quest netting revenues of $6.7 billion compared to $6.2 billion in 2006. LabCorp’s 2007 revenue came in at approximately $4 billion, up 13% from $3.5 billion in 2006. For 2008, Quest is projecting $7.3 billion in revenue, while LabCorp is projecting $4.5 billion in revenue.
Full Article |
| More Labs Turn to Alternative Competitive Strategies as Contract Prices Decline |
| While the nation’s largest insurance providers have secured long-term agreements with national reference laboratories, many smaller labs are finding themselves shut out of local and regional managed care contracts. In fact, preliminary results from a recent Washington G-2 Reports survey found that over 79% of respondents reported being excluded from these contracts. Pricing also continues to take a hit, with the current pricing of some contracts with independent laboratories estimated to range between 50% and 75% of Medicare.
Full Article |
| Physicians Name Insurance, Billing Woes as Top Nat’l Lab Complaints |
| Inaccurate billing, wrong or missing tests, and insurance issues are the chief problems with using Quest and LabCorp as a primary lab, according to results from a recent survey of 800 primary care physicians presented on February 7 at LabCompete 2008 in Tucson, Arizona.
Full Article |
| Benchmarking the National Labs—Quest and LabCorp Post Gains in Revenue per FTE |
| In their latest reporting periods, Quest Diagnostics (Madison, NJ) and LabCorp (Burlington, NC) reported moderately strong revenue gains of 8% and 13% respectively in 2007. This increase is also reflected in staff productivity and revenue per FTE, according to LIR’s analysis of benchmarking statistics. Both labs are even for 2007 with approximately $156,000 per FTE. This represents a more significant increase of almost 9% for LabCorp, from 2006’s annual revenue per FTE of $143,600. Quest had a smaller gain of 3% from 2006’s $151,000.
Full Article |
| As Managed Care Upheavals Subside, It’s Time for Labs to Strategize |
| Preliminary results from a Washington G-2 reports’ market research survey found that over 79% of independent and hospital outreach labs are currently excluded from local and regional managed care or health plan contracts. This is not surprising given the shake-ups in managed care contracting in recent years, particularly LabCorp’s exclusive contract with UnitedHealthcare (Minnetonka, MN), the nation’s second largest insurer. However, these findings underscore what industry insiders have been preaching in recent years: Labs must find innovative ways to these contracts, such as through establishing regional networks or providing clinical data to insurers.
Full Article |
| San Diego Labs Hope for Injunction to Halt Comp Bidding Demo |
| After a federal judge denied efforts by San Diego laboratories to stop the competitive bidding process through a temporary restraining order (TRO), the plaintiffs are now preparing to ask for an injunction to stop the program before the winning laboratories are announced in April. The three plaintiffs in the case are Sharp HealthCare and Scripps Health laboratories, as well as the Internist Laboratory of Oceanside, California.
Full Article |
| Symbion Deal Consolidates Australia’s Pathology Market |
| Australia’s largest healthcare company, Symbion Health Ltd. (Melbourne), is now under the control of the country’s second largest medical center operator, Primary Health Care Ltd. (Sydney), and the acquisition is set to have a major impact on the country’s estimated $A2.4 billion (U.S.$2.2 billion) pathology market by consolidating two of the four primary providers.
Full Article |
| As Quest Boosts Sales Efforts, Here’s How to Compete |
| In early February, Quest Diagnostics Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Robert A. Hagemann announced at the 2008 Wachovia Healthcare Conference in Boston that the company’s sales force is recommitting itself to getting new business and selling additional services to existing clients after the distracting contracting disruptions in recent years. To compete with this renewed commitment, labs need to strengthen their own sales efforts. For strategies and advice on boosting a lab’s sales and marketing, LIR recently spoke to Peter Francis, who has over 33 years of experience working in sales in the clinical laboratory industry, including Quest and SmithKline Beecham Clinical Labs. He is now president of Clinical Laboratory Sales Training, LLC (Woodstock, MD), a training and consulting company that provides selling methodologies and background test information for sales reps who market lab services.
Full Article |
| Lab Index Down 7% Over 5 Wks; Quest Down 5%, LabCorp Up 8% in February |
| This year continues to be a tough one for the lab industry, with the G-2 Laboratory Stock Index down 7% over the last five weeks for the week ended Feb. 22, 2008. But February wasn’t unkind to all the publicly traded laboratories, many of whom released fourth quarter and full year 2007 results last month. For instance, LabCorp (Burlington, NC) was up 8% to $79.29 per share for a market cap of $9.1 billion over the past four weeks for the week ended Feb. 22, 2008. Another company, Monogram Biosciences (South San Francisco, CA) was up 19% to $1.46 per share for a market cap of $193 million for the same time period.
Full Article |
| UnitedHealth in NY AG Cuomo’s Crosshairs for Reimbursement Fraud |
| As part of an ongoing investigation into fraudulent reimbursement rates, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has announced intentions to file suit against Ingentix Inc., the nation’s largest provider of healthcare billing information, which is owned by UnitedHealth Group (Minnetonka, MN). Cuomo’s office is alleging that Ingentix uses a "defective and manipulative" database to set reimbursement rates for out-of-network expenses. In addition, Cuomo is alleging that two subsidiaries of UnitedHealth have under-reimbursed their members for out-of-network medical expenses based on data provided by Ingentix. The attorney general’s office recently issued 16 subpoenas to insurance companies, including Aetna, Cigna, and Empire BlueCross BlueShied, as part of the investigation.
Full Article |
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