Three Heart Transplant Programs Receive Warning.

Regulators at the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services have threatened to pull funding from three additional heart transplant programs, continuing a national crackdown on substandard programs that began last year, the Los Angeles Times reported.

In letters sent June 29, CMS

gave the following hospitals 30 days to submit acceptable plans to overhaul their programs or lose federal funding: Christus Santa Rosa Hospital-Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas; Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis; and St. Vincent Indianapolis Hospital. A fourth program, at University of Kentucky Chandler Hospital, has agreed to withdraw from Medicare. In 2005 and 2006, each of the four programs performed fewer than the 12 heart transplants annually that Medicare required to ensure proficiency.

Since last year, eight transplant programs have agreed to forgo federal money, another five are operating under corrective plans approved by Medicare, and one, BryanLGH Medical Center East in Lincoln, Neb., has had its funding pulled.