Senator demands accountability for nurse assault at for-profit Iowa hospital.

Senator Chuck Grassley is demanding answers from Lifepoint Health and Apollo Global Management, the private-equity firm that owns the hospital system, about the sexual assault of nine female patients by a male nurse practitioner at Ottumwa Regional Health Center in Iowa. Grassley is asking whether financial practices reduced money for patient care and may have facilitated the sexual assault. The hospital is part of Lifepoint Health, which has more than 60 acute care hospitals in 17 states, including many rural hospitals. Private-equity firms have spent hundreds of billions of dollars buying up health care businesses, including nursing homes, hospital staffing companies, and physician practices.