Joseph Burns
Joseph Burns is the senior editor of The Dark Report. An independent journalist in Falmouth, Mass., Burns has covered health care since 1991 and clinical laboratories since 2004. He writes for a variety of publications, including Managed Care magazine (where he is a contributing editor), Hospitals & Health Networks, and Healthcare Finance News. In addition, he is the insurance topic leader for the Association of Health Care Journalists and has worked as a writer and editor for The Commonwealth Fund, the Health Care Incentives Improvement Institute, the National Business Coalition on Health, the National Committee for Quality Assurance, and the National Quality Forum. Burns has edited books on health care business strategies for Faulkner & Gray and Panel Publishers and was editor-in-chief of Business & Health magazine, formerly published by Medical Economics Co., and later was a contributing editor and columnist for Managed Healthcare Executive magazine. He began his career as a journalist in Connecticut, working as a newspaper reporter for The Wallingford Post and the Meriden Record-Journal and as a copy editor, reporter, and regional news editor for The Hartford Courant, the nation’s oldest newspaper. While working for The Courant, he taught news writing at the University of Connecticut.
Articles by Joseph Burns
Attorney Explains Risks from New ‘Support Act’
CEO SUMMARY: Legislation signed into law on Oct. 24 was designed to stem the nation’s opioid crisis. But in addition to applying to sober homes and addiction treatment centers, the law also applies to clinical laboratories. Called the ‘Support for Patients and Communities Act,’ the …
U of Florida Health Improves Patient Care with PGx Testing
CEO SUMMARY: Since 2011, the University of Florida Health System has used pharmacogenetic test (PGx) results to guide physicians when they prescribe certain drugs. This initiative has improved patient outcomes, reduced the overall cost per episode of care, and gained partial reimbursemen…
New Opioid Law Hits Labs Paying Sales Commissions
CEO SUMMARY: At the last minute, Congress added all clinical laboratories to a far-reaching anti-kickback provision in the newly-enacted Support for Patients and Communities Act. This provision applies to all payers, both government and private. Lab experts say this new law could have a n…
Sonic Uses Lab Data, Patient-Contact Tools, to Improve Outcomes
CEO SUMMARY: In its work for a federally qualified health center, Sonic Healthcare USA helped physicians use a data-driven approach to population health management that incorporated integrated financial and clinical analytics. Also, Sonic developed technologies that give ordering physicia…
Sonic Adds More Value to Help Physicians Treat CKD Patients
BUILDING ON THE LESSONS IT LEARNED by developing lab services that helped primary care physicians identify, diagnose, and treat diabetes patients in their practices, Sonic Healthcare USA was ready to do the same for another disease. Sonic wanted to go beyond simply reporting an accu…
NILA, ACLA Respond to CMS 2019 Final Lab Rule
CEO SUMMARY: On Nov. 2, the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services released its Physician Fee Schedule for 2019. It says it will expand the number of labs from which it collects data about the lab test prices paid by private health insurers. While some labs may welcome these c…
Project Santa Fe Labs Deliver Value with Tests
CEO SUMMARY: No bigger threat looms over the financial security of the nation’s clinical laboratories than healthcare’s transition from fee-for-service payment to value-based reimbursement. To navigate that transition successfully, medical labs and pathology groups will need to adopt …
Boston Heart Case Ruling Raises Questions for Labs
CEO SUMMARY: Is it a violation of federal healthcare laws when clinical labs pay physicians to mail specimens and/or forgive all or part of patients’ copayments and deductibles? A federal judge’s ruling in a lawsuit against Boston Heart Diagnostics last month dealing with these two ac…
Quest Acquires Two Labs, Two Other Health Firms
CEO SUMMARY: In the span of four days in September, Quest Diagnostics agreed to buy two lab companies and the lab testing service line of a third firm. In August, it purchased wellness company Provant Health, which had earlier filed a bankruptcy action. Each of these transactions helps Qu…
Are More Criminal Charges Coming in Theranos Case?
CEO SUMMARY: As a going business, Theranos may have been dissolved in September, but it continues to be in the news. The biggest development was a disclosure in federal court earlier this month by federal prosecutors that there may be additional criminal charges to come that go beyond the…
CURRENT ISSUE
Volume XXXII, No. 6 – April 21, 2025
Now that a federal judge has vacated the FDA’s LDT rule, The Dark Report analyzes the judgement and notes the various steps the FDA could take in response. Also, lab testing at pharmacies is proving to be less successful than was once anticipated.
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