Miraca closes Union Lab

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Pathbusiness

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Plus which was acquired by Miraca in 2014 is being closed for good in couple of months. Another feather in their cap.
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No surprise there.

We should all make predictions on the next labs to get closed. I keep wondering how much longer bio-reference/gen path will be around.
 
I just looked at their website. Am I correctly seeing that they have 31 dermatopathologists and 30 GI pathologists? :eek:

If this is correct, I agree with the above that this business model (88305 exclusive) is going the way of the dodo. I certainly hope those 61 pathologists have seen something other than just skin and colon polyps over the past few years because they're unemployable in any other practice.
 
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Alteran said:
I just looked at their website. Am I correctly seeing that they have 31 dermatopathologists and 30 GI pathologists? :eek:

If this is correct, I agree with the above that this business model (88305 exclusive) is going the way of the dodo. I certainly hope those 61 pathologists have seen something other than just skin and colon polyps over the past few years because they're unemployable in any other practice.
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A total of 61 paths at the Union lab? Is that right?
 
They have a yearly revenue in excess of $260M. Takes at least 61 Pathologists!
 
Well, there are another 20 or so pathologist in the that mill that claim their specialty to be either hematopathology, GU, or breast. So, it seems there are going to be about 80 pathologists who have been one trick ponies looking for work here shortly.
 
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They have 2 other labs. Specimens will be diverted to those.
 
Their main lab is in Irwing Texas, plus Phoenix and Boston Lab.
 
Alteran said:
Well, there are another 20 or so pathologist in the that mill that claim their specialty to be either hematopathology, GU, or breast. So, it seems there are going to be about 80 pathologists who have been one trick ponies looking for work here shortly.
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The specimens aren't vanishing so it is a zero sum game. The jobs move just like the work does.
 
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Some jobs are created but for the most part the work is just absorbed by others and productivity increases at those labs.

If the VA is privatized, you will see a loss of pathologist jobs. I have CAP inspected many VA over the years that I can't figure out why many even have an AP lab. Two pathologists for a few thousand tissues. Those days are coming to end.
 
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icpshootyz said:
"MHD has consistently denied liability but has decided to put the matter behind it and enter into a settlement"

Hahahaha, bulllllllll****. You settled because you were guilty and now we all want to know what you were guilty of.
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Check them out at glassdoor...
 
What's weird there no settlement news anywhere else that I can find.
Checked the DOJ site. It would be nice to know more.
 
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Thanks Pathbusiness. I was hoping we find what kind of false claims.
 
AZpath said:
Thanks Pathbusiness. I was hoping we find what kind of false claims.
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When the official DOJ press release comes out. I am sure this is just a minimal 10-K disclosure. It gets bigger by the time it is inked.
 
Doing AB/PAS on ALL stomach, duodenal and esophagus biopsies, every single part.
H.Pylori immunos on all stomach biopsies, including multi part with FP's.
Typical upper endo could have 88342x3, 88313 x 5.
 
Dave CX said:
Doing AB/PAS on ALL stomach, duodenal and esophagus biopsies, every single part.
H.Pylori immunos on all stomach biopsies, including multi part with FP's.
Typical upper endo could have 88342x3, 88313 x 5.
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That is one tiny scam in the bigger scheme of things...
 
Dave CX said:
Doing AB/PAS on ALL stomach, duodenal and esophagus biopsies, every single part.
H.Pylori immunos on all stomach biopsies, including multi part with FP's.
Typical upper endo could have 88342x3, 88313 x 5.
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Exactly. Or TCell markers on all duodenal biopsiesz
 
I fail to understand what are they paying the sixty three millions for? They don't have any business to save.
 
In that case Feds could get a lot more money out of Japs before they sold the company. There is a lot of money and information missing in this deal.
 
27G said:
Exactly. Or TCell markers on all duodenal biopsiesz
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I never used to order CD3 on duodenum until I got a case sent out for a second opinion. They did a CD3 and called it borderline increased. The GI doc threatened to send it elsewhere unless I did these. Now I do it on about half of them. Stuck between a rock and a hard place!!!
 
Thrombus said:
I never used to order CD3 on duodenum until I got a case sent out for a second opinion. They did a CD3 and called it borderline increased. The GI doc threatened to send it elsewhere unless I did these. Now I do it on about half of them. Stuck between a rock and a hard place!!!
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Stuck between a rock and hard place is the reason for most of inflated billing in GI, GU, and Derm.
 
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Thrombus said:
I never used to order CD3 on duodenum until I got a case sent out for a second opinion. They did a CD3 and called it borderline increased. The GI doc threatened to send it elsewhere unless I did these. Now I do it on about half of them. Stuck between a rock and a hard place!!!
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GI Path here...I'd like to know what place that was sent to. My training was at a pretty reputable institution for GI, and based on attending lectures from other experts as well, CD3 on duodenal bx is BS. Yes, you may often see much higher #s of intraepithelial lymphocytes on CD3 than you do on H&E, but what does that mean. Does that mean that if only using H&E you are "missing" a lot of cases of celiac. I doubt it. The standard cutoffs for assessing IELs is H&E, and a lot of experts may not even formally "count", but just eyeball it.

That is the annoying thing about our field sometimes...failure of our clinical colleagues to fully understand what we do...leading to unnecessary testing and increased expenditure.
 
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Thrombus said:
I never used to order CD3 on duodenum until I got a case sent out for a second opinion. They did a CD3 and called it borderline increased. The GI doc threatened to send it elsewhere unless I did these. Now I do it on about half of them. Stuck between a rock and a hard place!!!
Click to expand...

That gi doc sounds like an absolute *****.
 
My group recently took over a hospital-based practice with a decent volume and the pathologist we essentially booted out was sending ALL cases for outside consultation. It seemed like she was there to triage the gallbladders, appendix, etc. She couldn't seem to work-up any sort of tumor of unknown origin case or any heme case. Given her limited ability to work-up cases, I was interested in what she was sending out and noticed that even cervical cone biopsies (which for the most part SHOULD have a fairly straight forward H&E diagnosis) were being sent for full consultation. The consulting laboratory (in addition to their constant 88323 charge, which never seemed to change regardless of receiving supporting info or not) was doing between 8-27 IHC routinely, even on routine and clearly negative cases. One of the cone biopsy cases with CIN3 had 7 IHC employed, including P53, CD138, CK5/6, P16, D2-40, CD31 and Ki-67. A benign nephrogenic adenoma from a bladder bx was worked up with 16 IHC, including the illustrious Ki-67 and PHH3 IHC for the double 88360 charge. I saw an "atypical" pleural cytology case get 25 IHC and finally called ..."atypical" ... with the comment that "three epithelial markers were negative, thus excluding a metastatic carcinoma." I thought to myself, "ok so if those were negative, then why order TTF1, Napsin A, NKX3.1, etc etc."

I would say to this lab,"good luck" in getting reimbursed for the PC/TC as I am sure the commercial carriers would balk and probably only pay for a handful of IHCs reported. That is all fine and well, but what really sucks is that probably half of the cases are covered under the hospital DRG and the local lab was probably forced to pay the excessive TC charges at whatever contracted rate. I could imagine that the lab was forking over at least $30k/month in TC charges alone. I think it's time to make sure my whistle is working because this consulting lab is definitely one of the bad actors in our field and something needs to be done. Is this honestly what's going on in the real world?
 
cmz said:
My group recently took over a hospital-based practice with a decent volume and the pathologist we essentially booted out was sending ALL cases for outside consultation. It seemed like she was there to triage the gallbladders, appendix, etc. She couldn't seem to work-up any sort of tumor of unknown origin case or any heme case. Given her limited ability to work-up cases, I was interested in what she was sending out and noticed that even cervical cone biopsies (which for the most part SHOULD have a fairly straight forward H&E diagnosis) were being sent for full consultation. The consulting laboratory (in addition to their constant 88323 charge, which never seemed to change regardless of receiving supporting info or not) was doing between 8-27 IHC routinely, even on routine and clearly negative cases. One of the cone biopsy cases with CIN3 had 7 IHC employed, including P53, CD138, CK5/6, P16, D2-40, CD31 and Ki-67. A benign nephrogenic adenoma from a bladder bx was worked up with 16 IHC, including the illustrious Ki-67 and PHH3 IHC for the double 88360 charge. I saw an "atypical" pleural cytology case get 25 IHC and finally called ..."atypical" ... with the comment that "three epithelial markers were negative, thus excluding a metastatic carcinoma." I thought to myself, "ok so if those were negative, then why order TTF1, Napsin A, NKX3.1, etc etc."

I would say to this lab,"good luck" in getting reimbursed for the PC/TC as I am sure the commercial carriers would balk and probably only pay for a handful of IHCs reported. That is all fine and well, but what really sucks is that probably half of the cases are covered under the hospital DRG and the local lab was probably forced to pay the excessive TC charges at whatever contracted rate. I could imagine that the lab was forking over at least $30k/month in TC charges alone. I think it's time to make sure my whistle is working because this consulting lab is definitely one of the bad actors in our field and something needs to be done. Is this honestly what's going on in the real world?
Click to expand...

Blow the damn whistle. Bastards! This is what our damn profession has come to. Academia and our leaders are incompetent nincompoops!
 
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cmz said:
...the pathologist we essentially booted out was sending ALL cases for outside consultation.
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ALL as in 100%. There's no way this person could stay employed beyond a month if that. If they were solo, even the most incompetent of hospital administrators would realize this very quickly as they would be costing the hospital a lot of money. And if they were in a group (whether private or hospital-employed physicians) others would realize this individual can't hold their own and force them out. Either way, they should've been gone fast, prior to your group's arrival. There's got to be more to this story...was this person like 90 y.o. or something? Please elaborate. If for nothing else, hearing of the downfall of others in our specialty sometimes makes the rest of us feel better about being chained to the scope all day and makes for interesting stories...:corny:
 
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Was wondering how many of these two urologic pathologists are current or former professors at some of the world’s leading institutions
 
I’m wondering how many cases these two must be looking at each day.
 
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