House is waiting for Cuddy outside the OR. He makes a joke about Wilson's tendency to donate his liver to anyone who needs it (I love that this is a running joke now, by the way) before informing her that his patient is covered with boils and a giant abscess and thus needs an OR right away, so freezing Dr. Crybaby out of it was necessary. Cuddy says Dr. Crybaby will be done just as soon as he and his patient thaw out. She escapes House by dashing into an elevator at the same time as the nanny calls with an update on Rachel's condition: she barfed and still has a fever. Good thing we aren't watching an episode from Rachel's point of view. Cuddy tells the nanny to call back in a half hour before finally making it into her office for her 8:30 meeting with Eli Morgan, the representative for Generic Evil Health Insurance Company, whose contract with PPTH is up today. Eli and Cuddy have been trying to negotiate the terms of a new contract for months and Cuddy is apparently done with it. She hands Eli a folder that contains PPTH's "final offer:" a 12% increase in all reimbursements in return for PPTH agreeing to a capitated structure (as opposed to a "fee for service" structure, where the provider is paid for each service, the capitated structure pays a set amount per person enrolled regardless of what, if any, services he requires). Basically, Generic Evil Health Insurance Company is sick of paying out the ass for all of those expensive and unnecessary tests and scans House runs on his patients, so they've cleverly changed it so that now it's PPTH's finances that House will drain with his nonsense. Without even bothering to look at the proposal after all of Nurse Assistant's proofreading work, Eli tells Cuddy "not a chance" and turns to leave with a "say hi to your sister for me." What's that about? Is Cuddy's sister tight with evil health insurance companies or something? Cuddy gets tough and informs Eli that if he turns her offer down, PPTH will terminate its contract with GEHI Co. Eli isn't worried about this at all, figuring GEHI Co. has PPTH by the balls since GEHI Co. insures 80% of PPTH's patients and PPTH is the smallest hospital in GEHI Co.'s network, which means it doesn't have the same leverage as the larger hospitals do. "You can be expensive or small. But you can't be both," he says. Cuddy confidently says she hired a big-deal PR firm to represent PPTH and will make the contract termination announcement at 3 pm unless Eli changes his mind. Eli doesn't look like he's going to budge an inch.