The highest court in Massachusetts has upheld the dismissal of lawsuits filed by seven Massachusetts hospitals and a managed healthcare organization that claimed they were shortchanged by the state's 2006 health care law.
In two separate lawsuits, Boston Medical Center and the other hospitals claimed that the state had violated its obligation to reimburse them for the reasonable costs incurred in providing medical services to MassHealth enrollees.
The hospitals are known as "disproportionate share hospitals" because at least 63 percent of their patients are covered by Medicare, Medicaid or other government programs.
Both were dismissed by a lower court judge who found that neither state nor federal law authorizes judicial review of rates set by the state's Health and Human Services secretary.
On Friday, the state Supreme Judicial Court agreed and upheld dismissal of the lawsuits.
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