Health Affairs

One of the most important innovations of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is that it dramatically increases and improves the information that consumers have available about health insurance and health care.  HHS has already implemented provisions of the ACA requiring insurers to disclose information regarding their medical loss ratios and to publicly justify unreasonable rate... Read the rest of this entry »

All health care spending in the United States is projected to grow at an annual average rate of 5.8 percent for the period 2010 through 2020, 1.1 percentage points faster than expected growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP). By 2020, health care spending is projected to be 19.8 percent of GDP, nearly one-fifth of economic... Read the rest of this entry »

Section 1001 of the Affordable Care Act establishes women’s preventive health benefits as a new mandatory coverage class for all insurance products sold in the individual and group markets, self insured employer-sponsored health plans, and benchmark plans enrolling newly eligible Medicaid beneficiaries.  In implementing the Act in accordance with the tight deadlines established under the... Read the rest of this entry »

On July 7, 2011, Health Affairs will unveil its July 2011 issue, “New Directions In Systems Innovations.” The issue explores ongoing innovations in health care organization, delivery and financing across a broad front – from Vermont’s recent passage of single payer legislation, to new responsibilities for hospital boards of trustees as a consequence of the... Read the rest of this entry »

Thomas Saving’s and John Goodman’s post on the implications of the Affordable Care Act for Medicare leads the list of most-read Health Affairs Blog posts for May. On the list as well are posts on the hazards of ignoring the lessons of the Clinton years; the opportunities offered by clinical registries; and the implications of... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: In addition to Alain Enthoven and Leonard Schaeffer (photos and bios above), this post is coauthored by David Helwig and Phil Lebherz. Helwig retired as President and CEO West Region for WellPoint, Inc., and he also served as chief executive officer and president of Blue Cross of California. Lebherz is Chairman of LISI,... Read the rest of this entry »

On April 28th, the New England Journal of Medicine published the results of a study that compared two drugs head-to-head for the treatment of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the leading cause of legal blindness in the United States.  The two drugs, Ranibizumab (Lucentis) and Bevacizumab (Avastin), are very similar molecules and are both meant to... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: The authors of the post below, Dan Mendelson and Tanisha Carino, also wrote an earlier post on the initial decision of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to undertake a national coverage review of the cancer drug Provenge. In one of its most anticipated national coverage decisions (NCD), issued on March 30,... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: This is the latest in a series of posts by Timothy Jost on the implementation of the Affordable Care Act.  Earlier posts have analyzed some important guidances, as well as provisions governing premium review, medical loss ratios, insurance exchanges, coverage for pre-existing conditions, appeals of coverage denials, coverage for preventive services, a patient bill of rights, grandfathered... Read the rest of this entry »

The story was tragic. A Tuberculosis patient from India who died because the system which was expected to provide for his treatment failed to deliver… and then the dessert arrived.  The setting? The official dinner of the First Global Symposium on Health Systems Research organized at the Montreux Casino. A photo of the dying TB... Read the rest of this entry »

Federal District Court Judge Roger Vinson’s 78-page opinion in State of Florida v. United States Department of Health and Human Services is a remarkable piece of work.  This decision, concluding a case brought by twenty-six state governors or attorneys general (in addition to two private parties and a business association, the National Federation of Independent... Read the rest of this entry »

A new Health Policy Brief from Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation describes recent efforts by the US Department of Health and Human Services HHS to identify and enroll approximately 5 million uninsured children in the United States who are eligible for Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). This process also... Read the rest of this entry »

Below, Kavita Patel, former director of policy for the White House Office of Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs, discusses President Obama’s State of the Union address and House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) Republican response. See other posts on this topic by Len Nichols and Joseph Antos.  The Constitution mandates that the President “from time to time... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: Below, Len Nichols, Professor of Health Policy and Director of the Center for Health Policy Research and Ethics at George Mason University, discusses President Obama’s State of the Union address and House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) Republican response. See other posts on this topic by Kavita Patel and Joseph Antos.  In last night’s State... Read the rest of this entry »

On December 12, 2010, Judge Henry Hudson of the Eastern District of Virginia became the first federal judge to hold a provision of the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional.  The lawsuit was filed by the Attorney General of the Commonwealth of Virginia immediately after the reform statute was signed into law in March.  It challenges the... Read the rest of this entry »

Between 2007 and 2009, with increasing unemployment and declining incomes, the number of uninsured nonelderly Americans increased from forty-five million to fifty million. This finding is contained in a Health Affairs Web First article released today and authored by John Holahan, the director of the Urban Institute’s Health Policy Center. The Urban Institute study was prepared in partnership with the Kaiser... Read the rest of this entry »

The latest Health Policy Brief from Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation describes a new program to shore up health insurance coverage for early retirees—individuals 55 and older who have left employment and are not yet eligible for Medicare. The number of employers offering medical coverage for this group has declined during the... Read the rest of this entry »

Recent press reports on Medicare’s decision to evaluate coverage policy for the new cancer therapy Provenge were highly critical of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and its role in examining the evidence behind FDA-approved products.  Let’s take a step back. In fact, this is exactly what CMS should be doing – carefully... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: This is the latest in a series of posts by Timothy Jost on the implementation of the Affordable Care Act.  Earlier posts by Jost provide analyses of regulations implementing provisions of the Act governing coverage for pre-existing conditions, appeals of coverage denials, coverage for preventive services, a patient bill of rights, grandfathered plans, tax exempt hospitals, the small employer tax... Read the rest of this entry »

Editor’s Note: This week, senior health policy experts and emerging health care leaders from around the world have gathered in Salzburg, Austria, where the Salzburg Global Seminar, in association with the Nuffield Trust, has convened a health care series titled, “Reforming Health Care: Maintaining Social Solidarity and Quality in the Face of Economic, Health and Social Challenges.” Health Affairs Deputy... Read the rest of this entry »