Hospitals New York City

A Manhattan hospital is making HIV drugs available as a morning-after antidote for people who think they might have been exposed to the AIDS virus. The treatment from Beth Israel Medical Center consists of a four-week course of powerful drugs that are believed to reduce the likelihood of infection if taken within 72 hours of exposure to the virus.

A Manhattan hospital is making HIV drugs available as a morning-after antidote for people who think they might have been exposed to the AIDS virus. The treatment from Beth Israel Medical Center consists of a four-week course of powerful drugs that are believed to reduce the likelihood of infection if taken within 72 hours of exposure to the virus.

The private sector is emerging as a new battleground in a debate that has long consumed municipal governments--whether to extend employee benefits to the domestic partners of unmarried workers. On Tuesday, in a move that advocates of such benefits called "groundbreaking," a major New York medical center with 9,000 employees became the largest private employer in the United States to extend spousal benefits, including health insurance, to lesbian and gay staffers.

Paying $24 for one Tylenol tablet was a bitter pill to swallow for a patient who is suing a New York hospital for price gouging. Laurence Paskowitz said the price was listed on his bill for a seven-day stay at the Hospital for Special Surgery, where he underwent a knee operation. A hospital spokesman, Dick Auletta, said the $24 charge was for 12 pills.

A jury split the blame Monday in a lawsuit brought by writer Sidney Zion against the hospital where his 18-year-old daughter died, accepting a defense that the young woman failed to reveal she had used cocaine. The jury technically awarded Zion and his wife, Elsa, $750,000 for their daughter's pain and suffering. But a finding that Libby Zion was 50% responsible for her own 1984 death means the Zions will get half that amount, $375,000. The jury also awarded $1 in actual damages.

New York, Presbyterian Hospitals to Merge: Merger of the two hospitals would create one of the largest not-for-profit health-care systems in the country, with 2,600 beds. It is the third big merger among New York's private teaching hospitals in the last month. When completed, under the name the New York & Presbyterian Hospitals Health-Care System, the transaction would bring together more than 20 hospitals and other health-care institutions throughout the city. Their combined revenue exceeds $2.

Dr. Vincent T. DeVita Jr. will resign Sept. 1 as director of the National Cancer Institute to become chief physician at Memorial-Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. DeVita, 53, has been NCI director since 1975 and presided over an unprecedented expansion in the U.S. cancer-research effort. A chemotherapy expert, he is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in American medical research.

Lawyers for an AIDS-afflicted doctor suing New York City for negligence asserted that they had proved a city hospital was careless in disposing of infectious wastes. Dr. Veronica Prego claims that she contracted the disease from a needle left carelessly at Kings County Hospital. A professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Business testified that Prego could have made up to $30 million in her normal estimated working lifetime of 32.8 years had she not become infected.

A prestigious Manhattan hospital maintains separate maternity wards: one for mostly white private patients and another for mostly minority Medicaid patients, according to a published report. Poorer mothers at Mt. Sinai Medical Center are shunted off to a dreary ward with chipped paint and black walls and shortchanged on such services as education on nutrition and infant care, the Daily News reported Monday.

Paying $24 for one Tylenol tablet was a bitter pill to swallow for a patient who is suing a New York hospital for price gouging. Laurence Paskowitz said the price was listed on his bill for a seven-day stay at the Hospital for Special Surgery, where he underwent a knee operation. A hospital spokesman, Dick Auletta, said the $24 charge was for 12 pills.

Two hospitals where "Rent" playwright Jonathan Larson was treated before his death will be fined for misdiagnosing his severe chest pains, the state Health Department said Thursday. Larson, 35, was found dead in his apartment Jan. 25 just as "Rent," a 1990s version of "La Boheme," was about to open off-Broadway. The hit show later moved to Broadway and won four Tony awards. Larson died of a dissecting aortic aneurysm, a tear in the inner lining of the aorta, the department said.

New York, Presbyterian Hospitals to Merge: Merger of the two hospitals would create one of the largest not-for-profit health-care systems in the country, with 2,600 beds. It is the third big merger among New York's private teaching hospitals in the last month. When completed, under the name the New York & Presbyterian Hospitals Health-Care System, the transaction would bring together more than 20 hospitals and other health-care institutions throughout the city. Their combined revenue exceeds $2.

A jury split the blame Monday in a lawsuit brought by writer Sidney Zion against the hospital where his 18-year-old daughter died, accepting a defense that the young woman failed to reveal she had used cocaine. The jury technically awarded Zion and his wife, Elsa, $750,000 for their daughter's pain and suffering. But a finding that Libby Zion was 50% responsible for her own 1984 death means the Zions will get half that amount, $375,000. The jury also awarded $1 in actual damages.

A prestigious Manhattan hospital maintains separate maternity wards: one for mostly white private patients and another for mostly minority Medicaid patients, according to a published report. Poorer mothers at Mt. Sinai Medical Center are shunted off to a dreary ward with chipped paint and black walls and shortchanged on such services as education on nutrition and infant care, the Daily News reported Monday.

The private sector is emerging as a new battleground in a debate that has long consumed municipal governments--whether to extend employee benefits to the domestic partners of unmarried workers. On Tuesday, in a move that advocates of such benefits called "groundbreaking," a major New York medical center with 9,000 employees became the largest private employer in the United States to extend spousal benefits, including health insurance, to lesbian and gay staffers.

Lawyers for an AIDS-afflicted doctor suing New York City for negligence asserted that they had proved a city hospital was careless in disposing of infectious wastes. Dr. Veronica Prego claims that she contracted the disease from a needle left carelessly at Kings County Hospital. A professor at the Columbia University Graduate School of Business testified that Prego could have made up to $30 million in her normal estimated working lifetime of 32.8 years had she not become infected.

Two hospitals where "Rent" playwright Jonathan Larson was treated before his death will be fined for misdiagnosing his severe chest pains, the state Health Department said Thursday. Larson, 35, was found dead in his apartment Jan. 25 just as "Rent," a 1990s version of "La Boheme," was about to open off-Broadway. The hit show later moved to Broadway and won four Tony awards. Larson died of a dissecting aortic aneurysm, a tear in the inner lining of the aorta, the department said.

Dr. Vincent T. DeVita Jr. will resign Sept. 1 as director of the National Cancer Institute to become chief physician at Memorial-Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. DeVita, 53, has been NCI director since 1975 and presided over an unprecedented expansion in the U.S. cancer-research effort. A chemotherapy expert, he is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in American medical research.