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New Transparency Rules For Health Plans: A Huge Win For Consumers


February 10th, 2012
 
by Mila Kofman and Sabrina Corlette

Editor’s note: See another Health Affairs post on this topic by Tim Jost. How do you shop for health insurance today? For many of us, our employer makes the decision for us. And if there is a choice of health plans, the employer also provides helpful summaries of the benefits, premium differences, and cost-sharing so [...]

Implementing Health Reform: The Summary Of Benefits And Coverage


February 9th, 2012
by Timothy Jost

Editor’s note: Another Health Affairs Blog post, by Mila Kofman and Sabrina Corlette, also discusses the February 9 final rule implementing Affordable Care Act (ACA) requirements that health plans provide consumers with short, easy to understand summaries of benefits and coverage. Tim Jost’s post below discusses this new rule; additionally, it has also been updated [...]

Small Business Health Insurance Exchanges: Potential And Pitfalls


February 9th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

The Affordable Care Act’s state health insurance exchanges for small businesses present a host of opportunities for states now creating them, but they also present design and regulatory challenges that could make or break the success of the program, according to a cluster of articles in the February issue of Health Affairs, released yesterday. The [...]

New Health Affairs: Some Physicians Not Always Honest With Patients


February 8th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

Despite wide institutional acceptance of a medical professionalism charter that endorses openness and honesty in physicians’ interactions with patients, not all doctors comply, according to a survey whose results are published in the February 2012 issue of Health Affairs, released today. Although about two-thirds of doctors responding to the survey did agree that they should [...]

The ACA Supreme Court Litigation: The States’ Medicaid And Minimum Coverage Briefs


February 7th, 2012
by Timothy Jost

Briefs continue to be filed at a furious pace in the Affordable Care Act Supreme Court litigation.  On January 6, the federal government led off with its brief challenging the decision of the Eleventh Circuit federal court of appeals that the ACA’s minimum coverage requirement (individual mandate) is unconstitutional.  The states and the National Federation [...]

Two Health Affairs Articles Among RWJF’s 2011 Top Five


February 6th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

A belated tip of the hat to two Health Affairs articles included in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s five most influential research articles by RWJF grantees in 2011: Evidence Links Increases In Public Health Spending To Declines In Preventable Deaths, by Glenn Mays and Sharla Smith; and Nurses’ Widespread Job Dissatisfaction, Burnout, And Frustration With [...]

What Is “Sustainable” Health Spending?


February 3rd, 2012
by Charles Roehrig

As we embark upon a presidential campaign season, we can anticipate many lively debates on the topics of taxation and spending in this nation.  As health spending in the Unites States accounts for 18 percent of our gross domestic product – a rate often called unsustainable – it is critical that we be clear-eyed in [...]

Latest Wonk Review Highlights HA Blog Post On Bay State Reform


February 3rd, 2012
by Chris Fleming

At the Colorado Health Care Insider, Louise Norris hosts the latest edition of the Health Wonk Review. Louise includes Sharon Long’s Health Affairs Blog post clarifying the facts about health reform in Massachusetts. Check out Sharon’s post and all the great posts in Louise’s Wonk Review.

Trusting Government: A Tale Of Two Federal Advisory Groups


February 2nd, 2012
 
by David Kibbe and Brian Klepper

Americans increasingly distrust what they perceive as poorly run and conflicted government. Yet rarely can we see far enough inside the federal apparatus to examine what works and what doesn’t, or to inspect how good and bad decisions come to pass. Comparing the behaviors of two influential federal advisory bodies provides valuable lessons about how [...]

Health Policy Briefs: Accountable Care Organizations


January 31st, 2012
by Chris Fleming

In April 2012 a number of accountable care organizations (ACOs) will begin their contracts with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) under Medicare’s Shared Savings and Pioneer ACO programs. The latest health policy brief from Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation provides an overview of ACOs, their origins, and the current [...]

The Facts On Massachusetts Health Reform


January 30th, 2012
by Sharon Long

Last Thursday’s Republican Presidential Debate in Florida included a lively, but not always accurate, exchange on health reform in Massachusetts.  In particular, Senator Santorum reported that one in four Massachusetts residents were going without needed care because of high costs; he also implied that the share of residents choosing to pay the fine for failing [...]

Massachusetts Health Reform: How It Fared In 2010


January 26th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

Massachusetts’s health reform bill, which provided the template for the federal Affordable Care Act, went into effect in 2006. In a statewide survey taken in 2010, 94.2 percent of the state’s nonelderly (19–64) residents reported being covered, a significant increase over the 86.6 percent estimate of 2006. The survey is reported in a Health Affairs [...]

View Health Affairs Diabetes Briefing


January 26th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

Video of the release event for the January issue of Health Affairs, “Confronting The Growing Diabetes Crisis,” is now available on the Health Affairs Web site.

Care Innovations Summit: Live Webcast Available


January 25th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

WHAT:      More than 1,000 health care leaders, entrepreneurs, innovators, government officials and others will join the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), Health Affairs, the West Wireless Health Institute and keynote speaker Dr. Atul Gawande, at the Care Innovations Summit. WHO:       Marilyn Tavenner, Acting Administrator, [...]

Patient-Centered Care: What It Means And How To Get There


January 24th, 2012
by James Rickert

At a recent symposium concerning both saving money and improving patient care, Health Affairs Editor-in Chief Susan Dentzer stated, “It is well established now that one can in fact improve the quality of health care and reduce the costs at the same time.”  This is exactly the principle behind the growing movement toward patient-centered care.  [...]

It Takes A Village: Caring For Children With Diabetes


January 23rd, 2012
 
by Michelle Katz and Lori Laffel

Editor’s Note: The January 2012 issue of Health Affairs is a thematic volume titled “Confronting The Growing Diabetes Crisis.” Ariella was a different child, thin and shy, when I first met her about a year and a half ago, just after her 6th birthday. Her mother had noted her thirst and hunger, and, despite this [...]

The Latest Edition Of The Health Wonk Review


January 20th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

At Workers’ Comp Insider, Julie Ferguson hosts the latest edition of the Health Wonk Review. Despite Julie’s observation that January is “beer month,” there are no indications that she was anything but sober in writing eloquently about some of the most interesting health policy blogging of the last couple of weeks. Julie graciously includes Tim [...]

A New Federal Push To Increase Health Literacy


January 19th, 2012
by Chris Fleming

Most Americans struggle to understand health information and navigate the health care system, which can lead to preventable hospitalizations, greater use of emergency care, and reduced overall health status. To avoid costly “crisis care,” both health professionals and organizations must consider Americans’ health literacy skills—that is, their capacity to obtain, communicate, process, and understand basic [...]

The Misleading Arguments In The States’ Medicaid Coercion Brief


January 19th, 2012
 
by Sara Rosenbaum and Katherine Hayes

On January 10th, the states filed their latest arguments in their bid to have the ACA’s Medicaid expansion declared an unconstitutional coercion.  Following an effort to piece together a coercion doctrine from dicta found in a handful of Supreme Court cases, the states assert that the “[t]he ACA is Premised on the Understanding that It [...]

The Transition Abyss


January 18th, 2012
by Jerald Winakur

In June of 2011, I flew to Washington, D.C. to say good-bye to my friend, Alvin.  I wanted to be there with him and his family during his peaceful passage from this life.  Unfortunately, his end was not peaceful.  It was a nightmare because he, like too many patients being transferred from one level of [...]

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