JULY 24, 2026 – Nicklaus Children’s Health System has been named one of three finalists for the American Hospital Association’s (AHA) 2026 Quest for Quality Prize, one of the nation’s highest honors recognizing leadership and innovation in healthcare quality and patient safety. The finalists and recipient were announced during the AHA’s Leadership Summit in Denver.

Presented annually since 2002, the Quest for Quality Prize recognizes hospitals and health systems that demonstrate exceptional leadership in improving quality, advancing patient safety and delivering better health outcomes for communities they serve. Nicklaus Children’s joins Advocate Health and Connecticut Children’s as finalists, while Ralph H. Johnson VA Health System was named the 2026 recipient.

“This year’s AHA Quest for Quality honorees demonstrate how a deep commitment to innovations in data-driven safety initiatives can transform care and strengthen communities,” said AHA President and CEO Rick Pollack. “These hospitals and health systems are leading the way in building cultures where safety and quality are the North Star, setting a powerful example for others across the country.”

The recognition highlights Nicklaus Children’s commitment to its Safety for All framework, a comprehensive approach that fosters a culture of psychological safety by protecting patients, families, team members and the communities it serves from preventable harm while empowering everyone to improve outcomes together.

“Being recognized by the American Hospital Association as one of the nation’s top health systems for quality is an honor and a reflection of our commitment to creating the safest possible environment for every child and family we serve,” said Matthew Love, president and chief executive officer of Nicklaus Children’s Health System. “This recognition belongs to every member of our team whose dedication to continuous improvement, innovation and collaboration ensures that quality and safety remain at the center of everything we do.”

Finalist: Nicklaus Children’s — Miami

Nicklaus Children’s Health System operates across South Florida, including 10 primary care centers, 19 outpatient and specialty centers and 10 urgent care centers. The nonprofit system’s “Safety for All” framework builds a culture of psychological safety by creating environments where patients, families, staff and communities are protected from preventable harm and empowered to improve outcomes together. The Safety for All approach is led by cross-functional teams from patient safety, public safety, employee well-being, risk management, employee health, environment of care and emergency management. The program includes a workplace violence prevention initiative that led to an 11% improvement in staff perception of workplace safety in 2024 and an adaptive care program for children with developmental or sensory needs that reduced staff injuries from behavioral events by 63% between 2021 and 2024. Leadership doubled psychiatric bed capacity in 2023, reducing out of system transfers by 90% and lowering emergency department wait times by 26%.

About Nicklaus Children’s Health System – Where Your Child Matters Most ™

For more than 75 years, Nicklaus Children’s Health System has stood as a beacon of hope for children and families across the state of Florida and beyond. Nicklaus Children’s Hospital is South Florida’s #1 nonprofit, freestanding specialty licensed hospital exclusively for children. Nicklaus Children’s provides pediatric care across a growing network of hospital and community-based partnerships, including within NCH North Hospital in Naples, Jupiter Medical Center, select Baptist Health Hospital pediatric emergency units, as well as at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital Fort Lauderdale and Nicklaus Children’s Hospital Coral Springs, each located on the campuses of Broward Health. The hospitals and their network of more than 35 outpatient locations offer lifesaving care in Miami-Dade, Broward, Martin and Palm Beach counties. Outpatient locations include an array of urgent, pediatric primary and specialty care centers and are either hospital-based or outpatient locations under Nicklaus Children’s Pediatric Specialists, LLC (NCPS). Providing a pipeline of future physicians and groundbreaking research, Nicklaus Children’s is an academic and clinical affiliate of the Florida International University Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine and home to centers of excellence including the Helen & Jacob Shaham Cancer & Blood Disorders Institute, theOrthopedic, Sports Medicine and Spine Institute, the Neuroscience Institute and the Heart Institute. The 474-bed system is renowned for excellence in all aspects of pediatric medicine, with many programs routinely ranked among the nation’s best by U.S. News & World Report since 2008. Nicklaus Children’s also includes a nonprofit physician practice subsidiary with more than 40 pediatric specialties and an ambulatory surgery center. For more information, visit nicklauschildrens.org.

 

About the American Hospital Association (AHA)
The American Hospital Association (AHA) is a not-for-profit association of healthcare provider organizations and individuals that are committed to the health improvement of their communities. The AHA advocates on behalf of our nearly 5,000 member hospitals, health systems and other healthcare organizations, our clinician partners — including more than 270,000 affiliated physicians, 2 million nurses and other caregivers — and the 43,000 healthcare leaders who belong to our professional membership groups. Founded in 1898, the AHA provides insight and education for healthcare leaders and is a source of information on healthcare issues and trends. For more information, visit the AHA website at www.aha.org.



By Martha Waggoner

JULY 15, 2026 – Citing the increase in the cost of fuel, the IRS has set a higher optional standard mileage rate used to calculate the deductible costs of operating an automobile for business for the remainder of 2026.

Announcement 2026-11 modified Notice 2026-10. It revised the optional standard mileage rates for computing the deductible costs of operating an automobile for business, medical, or moving expense purposes and for determining the reimbursed amount of these expenses that is deemed substantiated.

The American Automobile Association reported that the average price for regular gasoline was $2.819 a gallon on Jan. 8, and $3.890 on July 15, an increase of 38%.

The revised standard mileage rates, effective July 1, are: 76 cents per mile for business, an increase from 72.5 cents, and 23.5 cents per mile for medical and moving purposes, up from 20.5 cents per mile for each. The mileage rate that applies to the deduction for charitable contributions is fixed under Sec. 170(i) of the Internal Revenue Code at 14 cents per mile.

All other provisions of Notice 2026-10 remain in effect.

The last midyear adjustment of the standard mileage rate was in 2022.



July 24, 2026 — Lee Health has appointed healthcare finance executive Heather Brandon, CPA, as vice president of financial services. A seasoned financial leader with extensive experience in health system operations, Brandon will help guide Lee Health’s financial strategy and support the organization’s continued growth and commitment to high-quality patient care.

In her role, Brandon, a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), will oversee the health system’s financial operations, helping ensure Lee Health’s long-term financial strength while supporting its mission to provide high-quality care to the Southwest Florida community. She will lead the health system’s financial strategy and oversee core financial functions, including reporting, budgeting, reimbursement and long-term financial planning.

Most recently, Brandon was the vice president of finance and system corporate controller at OhioHealth in Columbus, Ohio. There, she managed financial reporting, accounting, operations, compliance, policies, external filings, cost management and financial support for a rapidly expanding health system.

“Heather is an accomplished healthcare finance leader with deep expertise in financial strategy, operations and stewardship,” said John Mallia, interim chief financial officer for Lee Health. “Her experience supporting complex health systems and driving financial excellence will be instrumental as we continue to strengthen our organization and invest in the future of healthcare for the communities we serve. We are excited to welcome Heather to the Lee Health team.”

Brandon previously held the roles of hospital chief financial officer at Grant Medical Center and director of hospital support. Earlier in her career, she was controller and accounting manager for The Ohio State University’s clinical services division.

Brandon earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Ohio Wesleyan University and has significant experience serving on boards in healthcare joint ventures, startups, banking, transportation and linen services.

She has been a board member of the American Red Cross Buckeye Region and actively volunteers in the community. Brandon is also part of the Healthcare Financial Management Association and has previously been involved with the Ohio Society of CPAs, the AICPA and the Forbes Finance Council.

She began her position with Lee Health earlier this month.

To learn more, please visit www.leehealth.org.

 

About Lee Health

Lee Health has been a cornerstone of health care in Southwest Florida since opening its first hospital in 1916. As a non-profit, integrated health system, Lee Health is dedicated to providing high-quality, compassionate care to everyone, regardless of their ability to pay. With a strong commitment to community health and wellness, Lee Health commits to evolving with the growing and changing needs of the region. The system offers comprehensive services through four acute care hospitals, Golisano Children’s Hospital, three skilled nursing locations, outpatient facilities, urgent care centers, and a wide network of primary care and specialty practices. Lee Health supports every step of the health journey, from preventive care to advanced treatment for every member of our community. Learn more at www.LeeHealth.org.



Researchers identify a rare mutation that blocks both BTK inhibitors and next-generation BTK degraders

July 24, 2026 – Scientists at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, part of the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, and collaborators have uncovered a rare genetic mutation that enables some blood cancers to evade both approved Bruton tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitors and newer BTK degraders, a finding that could help shape the next generation of therapies for patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and related malignancies.

Published in Cancer Discovery, the study, “Molecular and Structural Basis of Pan-Resistance to BTK Degraders and Inhibitors,” identifies a mutation known as BTK A428D as a powerful mechanism of resistance to virtually every BTK-targeted therapy currently available or in development. The findings provide new insight into how cancers evolve under treatment pressure and why some patients eventually exhaust their targeted therapy options.

“The main finding was that a new BTK mutation, first described by us in 2022, causes resistance in patients treated with BTK degraders,” said Justin Taylor, M.D., co-author of the study and physician-scientist at Sylvester. “The BTK A428D mutation has emerged as a resistance mechanism to these BTK degraders in clinical trials, and those in development, plus all approved BTK inhibitors.”

BTK inhibitors have transformed treatment for CLL and other B-cell malignancies by blocking a protein that cancer cells depend on for growth and survival. More recently, researchers developed BTK degraders, a class of drugs designed to eliminate the BTK protein altogether and overcome resistance to earlier therapies.

Previous studies from Taylor’s laboratory demonstrated that the most common mutations responsible for BTK inhibitor resistance remained susceptible to BTK degraders. The newly identified A428D mutation, however, appears to evade both approaches.

Using molecular, biochemical and structural analyses, the researchers found that the mutation dramatically alters the shape of the BTK protein, preventing drugs from attaching to their target.

“Understanding exactly how these resistance mutations emerge gives us a roadmap for identifying patients at risk and developing strategies to stay one step ahead of the disease,” said Allison Cool, a researcher at Sylvester and co-first author of the study.

The researchers discovered that the A428D mutation changes the structure of the BTK protein in a way that prevents drugs from binding to it.

“The surprising part was that the BTK A428D has a completely different conformation that makes it impossible for any drugs to bind to it,” Taylor said.

The discovery helps explain how a single mutation can drive resistance across multiple classes of BTK-targeted therapies. At the same time, the researchers found that the mutation comes with a biological tradeoff-–it reduces the fitness of cancer cells. That finding may explain why A428D is seen primarily in patients treated with BTK degraders rather than in patients receiving BTK inhibitors alone.

“The significance of this finding is that patients who develop these resistance mutations do not have any options for further BTK-targeted therapy,” Taylor said.

As targeted therapies continue to improve outcomes and extend survival for patients with blood cancers, understanding how resistance develops has become one of the most pressing challenges in cancer research. By identifying the structural basis of resistance, the study provides a roadmap for developing future therapies capable of overcoming or bypassing these mutations.

The study also offers encouraging evidence that resistance may be preventable. Researchers found that combining BTK degraders with a different class of drugs that target the BCL2 protein prevented resistant cancer cells from emerging in preclinical models. The findings support further investigation of combination therapies for patients with CLL and other B-cell malignancies.

“As part of the paper, we showed that adding a different class of drug targeting the BCL2 protein to the BTK degraders can prevent the emergence of resistance,” Taylor said. “Our future directions will be to further test combination therapy for CLL.”

“While the A428D mutation explains resistance in some patients, our work is focused on uncovering the additional mechanisms that drive BTK degrader resistance and identifying new therapeutic approaches to overcome them,” Cool said.

The research team is continuing to investigate other causes of BTK degrader resistance, as not all patients whose cancers progressed carried the A428D mutation. Scientists are also exploring new BTK-targeting strategies designed to overcome resistance and extend the benefits of precision medicine for patients with blood cancers.

The findings underscore the importance of integrating structural biology, genomics and translational research to stay ahead of cancer evolution and develop more durable cancer therapies. As researchers continue to unravel the mechanisms behind treatment resistance, the work may help pave the way for new approaches that keep patients responding to targeted therapies longer.

Read more about Sylvester’s efforts to advance cancer research through big data on the InventUM blog and follow @SylvesterCancer on X for the latest news on its research and care.

 

Publication: Cancer Discovery

Article Title: “Molecular and Structural Basis of Pan-Resistance to BTK Degraders and Inhibitors”

Authors: A complete list of authors is available in the paper.

DOI: 10.1158/2159-8290.CD-26-0251

Funding/Disclosures: Funding and disclosures are included in the article.



July 23, 2026 – Dr. Mehmet Oz, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, visited Tampa General Hospital (TGH) to see the academic health system’s nationally-recognized food service model, delivering fresh, nutrient dense meals to patients.

Dr. Mehmet Oz, administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, visits Tampa General Hospital on July 23, 2026, in Tampa, Florida. During the visit, Oz toured the academic health system’s nationally recognized Food is Medicine program, met with food service and clinical team members, participated in a tasting of patient meals developed in partnership with Iron Chef Geoffrey Zakarian, and toured Tampa General’s Care Coordination Center (C3), where advanced technology, artificial intelligence and clinical expertise help optimize patient care and outcomes.

Tampa General’s world-class menu was developed in partnership with Iron Chef Geoffrey Zakarian and in collaboration with Dr. Tanuja Sharma, TGH Medical Director of Integrative Medicine and Arts. It is inspired by the Mediterranean diet, rooted in science and crafted for flavor, balance and recovery.

The menu is part of Tampa General’s Food is Medicine initiative, which prioritizes nutritious foods to accelerate healing and promote health and wellness.

Dr. Oz’s visit comes on the heels of a visit from U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins last week. Tampa General is the first hospital in the nation to sign the ‘Make Hospital Food Healthy Again’ pledge, cementing its commitment to put nutrition at the core of care.

Event Highlights Included: 

  • A menu tasting of Chef Geoffrey Zakarian’s menu, available to patients at Tampa General’s Davis Islands campus
  • A visit with the kitchen staff, dietitian and food service coordinators who maintain Tampa General’s food-as-medicine-focused approach in day-to-day operations
  • A tour of the Care Coordination Center (C3), a state-of-the-art facility where cutting edge technology, artificial intelligence and clinical expertise converge to optimize patient care and improve patient outcomes.

Photos and high-resolution video from the event are available for media use. They can be viewed at: https://mediashare.tgh.org/dr-oz-visits-tgh. Credit should be given to Tampa General Hospital.

ABOUT TAMPA GENERAL HOSPITAL 

Tampa General Hospital, Florida’s premier academic health system, is a 1,530-bed not-for-profit network of hospital and outpatient services spanning Florida. As the only center for Level l trauma and comprehensive burn care center serving 23 counties, Tampa General  delivers world-class care. The system’s hospitals include Tampa General Hospital, Tampa General Rehabilitation Hospital, Tampa General Behavioral Health Hospital, all in Tampa; Tampa General Brooksville, Tampa General Spring Hill and Tampa General Crystal River. Tampa General is the highest-ranked hospital in Tampa Bay in U.S. News & World Report’s 2025-2026 Best Hospitals, with six medical specialties ranking among the top 50 in the nation and five additional medical specialties ranked among the top 10% best hospital programs in the United States. As the first hospital in Florida to open a clinical command center for real-time situational awareness, the academic health system has elevated its digital care coordination center to the next level by leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) and its analytics platform across inpatient and outpatient care to ensure patients receive leading-edge care as quickly and safely as possible. Tampa General’s commitment to growing and developing its team members is recognized by three prestigious Forbes magazine rankings — in the 2026 America’s Best Large Employers ranked as the Tampa Bay region’s #1 employer in the healthcare category for the sixth year in a row, and among the top five in the state of Florida, in the 2025 Best Employers by State and the 2023 America’s Best Employers for Women.

Tampa General is the area’s safety-net hospital, caring for anyone regardless of ability to pay; in fiscal year 2024, Tampa General provided a net community benefit of approximately $289.1 million in the form of healthcare for underinsured patients, community education and financial support to community health organizations in Tampa Bay. It is recognized as one of the leading adult solid organ transplant centers in the nation and is the primary teaching hospital for the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine. With five medical helicopters, Tampa General transports critically injured or ill patients from surrounding counties to receive the advanced care their conditions require. Tampa General has a nationally accredited comprehensive stroke center and its 32-bed Neuroscience Intensive Care Unit is the largest on the West Coast of Florida. It is home to the Muma Children’s Hospital at TGH, the Jennifer Leigh Muma 82-bed neonatal intensive care unit and a nationally accredited rehabilitation center. Tampa General’s footprint includes TGH North, which consists of three hospitals and several outpatient locations in Citrus and Hernando counties; 17 Tampa General Medical Group Primary Care offices; TGH Family Care Center Kennedy; two TGH outpatient centers; TGH Virtual Health; and 20 TGH Imaging outpatient radiology centers throughout Hillsborough, Pasco, Pinellas and Palm Beach counties. Tampa Bay area residents receive world-class care from the TGH Urgent Care, powered by the Fast Track network of clinics. To see a medical care professional live anytime, anywhere on a smartphone, tablet or computer, visit Virtual Health | Tampa General Hospital (tgh.org). For more information, go to www.tgh.org.