Talk:University of Pittsburgh Medical Center

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I thnik this rates at least a start class. Could use an expanded history section, famous graduates. etc.Pustelnik 20:52, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Magee-Womens Hospital

There is no apostrophe in the official name of Magee-Womens Hospital of UPMC. Please see page 12 of the UPMC branding guide for further clarification of official names of the UPMC affiliated hospitals.CrazyPaco (talk) 23:37, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Historical information on early formation of the University Medical Center

The history on the formation of the early university medical consortium in the 1930s, often having been referred to at the time as the "University Medical Center", is correct and is referred to by two contemporaneous sources (The Owl & Post-Gazette) and a third historical source (Pitt). There is no reason for removal of this information as "historical error" because 1) it is not error, and 2) it shows the progression of the affiliations of the Oakland-based hospitals and School of Medicine that evolved into the modern UPMC entity. Because this information has been erroneously removed on multiple occasions, despite the presence of inline citations of reliable sources, please read the accompanying source material and discuss the reasoning for any changes and/or removal of this material in order to build consensus. Also, hospital names should reflect their historical nomenclature at the time referred prior to their particular mergers. CrazyPaco (talk) 19:09, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

Reverted deletion of UPMC Braddock subsection

I reverted Crazypaco's removal of text added regarding UPMCs recent and ongoing closure of UPMC Braddock hospital. The text is notable, having been mentioned in local media, and on national wire services, and helps to flesh out this article in terms that also include UPMC's controversial actions. Please do not delete it again, but DO please integrate it better into the article! :) If anything, the article needs more information on UPMCs more controversial decisions and impacts, in general, than the more promotional, booster-ish slant it has now. Thanks. --NightMonkey (talk) 01:49, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

And I reverted them back. Braddock is no longer a facility of UPMC and does not fit in the facilities section. Even if it was still a facility, it would have a single listing like the rest of the community hospitals of UPMC. Braddock has its own article at UPMC Braddock, which is linked to from the UPMC history section and the UPMC template, and the controversy can be described thoroughly there. If you want to create a UPMC controversies section for this article, than do so. However, Undue weight should not be given to Braddock considering the large scope of this article, and it certainly does not appropriately fit in the facilities section comprised only of current facilities (it is not the only former facility e.g. Lee regional, etc). CrazyPaco (talk) 03:32, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

OK, I've created a controversies section under "History". I do agree with you that, for now, the information regarding Braddock should not be in the Facilities section as it is structured now. Sorry about that. However, since this is not UPMC's private web space (aka not www.upmc.org), listings of both open and closed facilities seems appropriate in the Facilities section, but perhaps with subsections delineating open vs. closed. In the future, I ask that you integrate well-sourced edits by your fellow editors into the article better, rather than delete them, presuming they meet other WP policies well. As it stands, before my recent edit, the History section seems quite biased, and reads much like it was written as UPMC promotional material, while many of its citations largely come from University of Pittsburgh's own vanity press. Thanks. --NightMonkey (talk) 03:58, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I wrote most of it. It actually mostly comes from the University of Pittsburgh digital archives, including yearbooks, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette expose on UPMC, and Alberts and Starrett's histories of the university. None of those are vanity press, and really Brignano's history isn't either if you actually read it. I actually had to battle what I assume is a UPMC operative Res932 to get it to stay as is, which is factual and historically accurate. It seems that you might have an agenda of your own, and I strongly urge you to heed WP:POV. CrazyPaco (talk) 04:38, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

I hear you. I appreciate your work. I've had articles that I've written most of, or created from scratch, and it can hurt to have others start editing it. :) I think we should work together to make it WP:POV, and hopefully other editors will help. As WP editors (and humans), it is to be assumed that we all have biases. The WP policies help us all to keep those in check to produce better articles. --NightMonkey (talk) 00:47, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Hey, hey, you edited your comment while I was editing, so I missed what you were saying about Lee Regional Hospital in Johnstown. I hadn't heard about that. That seems like a good candidate for the History:Controversies section! Some local media coverage is here: http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/stories/2004/09/06/story5.html , and I'll search for more reliable sources. :) --NightMonkey (talk) 04:05, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Lee was not a controversial closing, nor were really any of the others. Only Braddock was significantly controversial. CrazyPaco (talk) 04:33, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Hrm. This article would seem to indicate otherwise: http://www.physiciansnews.com/cover/804.html . '[John] Augustine [chair of Lee Regional Health System – the hospital’s former owner] says that Lee Regional has benefited from UPMC’s services and clinical expertise and has been operating in the black, but has been shouldering large "enterprise expenses" he says UPMC adds each month to its hospitals’ balance sheets, which he says has put Lee Regional out of the black.' That article also has coverage of UPMC Shadyside's "happiness" over merging with UPMC, which also might merit mention. --NightMonkey (talk) 05:27, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

What? There is absolutely no controversy in that article. Lee regional was sold to Conemaugh Health System. There was nothing controversial about it: no protests, no lawsuits, no media coverage of a controversy, hardly any media coverage of it at all. You are fishing for things that did not receive notable coverage and the merger and sale of Lee is a minor blip on the overall topic of UPMC. It certainly doesn't deserve coverage in this article given its current scope. Braddock is certainly a well publicized controversy that received large amounts of media attention and it merits mention. There is no need to invent or exaggerate controversies here. CrazyPaco (talk) 06:59, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Keep up the WP:Good Faith, please. I'm not "fishing". I do like what you've done with the Criticisms and Controversies section. No need to go for the jugular here. --NightMonkey (talk) 00:20, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Also, do keep in mind that WP:notable "... only outline how suitable a topic is for its own article. They do not directly limit the content of articles". I'd say that WP:verifiablity perhaps applies better in your example. That said, I know what you meant. I put it here, instead of in the article, so it could be discussed. :) --NightMonkey (talk) 00:35, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

UPMC and University of Pittsburgh Press as citation sources

On a quick glance, I counted about 6 citations of University of Pittsburgh Press publications, and several citations from UPMC sources (I'll do a real count later). Using WP:Verifiable as a guide, these should probably be minimized. Over the next days I'll take a deeper look at them and see if they have more reliable sources or should be removed for lack of good citations. --NightMonkey (talk) 00:42, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

I think this has been addressed. [edit] I thought this was a recent comment (didn't see the date). CrazyPaco (talk) 06:42, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Non Profit? Ha Ha Ha! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 8.225.200.133 (talk) 22:24, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

"UPMC Insurance Services, operating under the umbrella UPMC Health Plan brand, was founded in 1998 and includes various for-profit and non-profit health care financing initiatives"

  Explain what you mean by "non-profit" in the context of "financing initiatives"  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 8.225.200.133 (talk) 22:28, 1 May 2013 (UTC) 

 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 8.225.200.133 (talk) 21:24, 20 May 2013 (UTC) 

"financing initiatives"??

   Insurance HMO's are an arm of finance capital.  They accumulate colossal sums of free loan capital which is then loaned to Capitalists to further exploit the working masses.  Insurance companies compete with banks and investment companies and form an ever growing part of the Financial Oligarchy.  Hospitals are for profit industries and are part of the Non-Productive Sphere which under the Capitalist mode of production are connected with the extraction of profit/surplus value. Hospitals and Insurance Companies are an example of the Parasitism of Imperialism/State Monopoly Capitalism.  All this being said, this Wikipedia article becomes trivial and meaningless.

Information on controversies

The article https://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/july-august-2020/elite-hospitals-have-an-epidemic-of-greed/ has some additional information on controversies, including UPMC's decision on 3/20/2020 to continue conducting elective surgeries, the large amount of property that UPMC owns for which it pays no property taxes, and its decision around 2018 to "require out-of-network patients, including seniors on Highmark Medicare Advantage, to pay all estimated charges up front and in full before receiving treatment for non–emergency room services". -- John Broughton (♫♫) 00:20, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Why Aren't The Controversies Mentioned?

Why aren't the many controversies over UPMC's extraordinary wealth, executive pay and avoidance of taxes mentioned? Why are there only 2 medical doctors on a non-profit hospital board, out of 24 directors? Why are hospital vendors and so many businessmen on a non-profit hospital board? It's undoubtably why top hospital executives were paid $225 million in 2021... Certainly, executive compensation and the taxation controversies should be incorporated in the article. Stevenmitchell (talk) 22:27, 12 July 2023 (UTC)