Health Affairs

Read about some comings and goings at foundations and an appointment to the Institute of Medicine. Ned Calonge, president and chief executive officer (CEO) of the Colorado Trust, was elected to the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in October. A physician, Calonge is a former medical director for the state of Colorado and is on the [...]

This GrantWatch column in the just-released February 2011 issue of Health Affairs is full text, free access, to all readers. As many of you are aware, under the Affordable Care Act of 2010, individuals and small businesses, as of 2014, will be able to compare health insurance plans and enroll in them through state-based marketplaces [...]

Every few weeks I do a round-up highlighting a few recent posts from foundation blogs that have caught my eye. Topics this time are global health (specifically, neglected tropical diseases), health reform, wellness, and lessons learned by a seasoned funder. Global Health/Neglected Tropical Diseases “Tackling Neglected Tropical Diseases,” by Julie Jacobson, on the Bill and [...]

The head of one of the largest private foundations in the United States, the California Endowment, explains how it came to the decision to show its support for the constitutionality of the federal health reform act. Nearly everyone would agree that greater access to health care for all Californians is a good thing. As the [...]

Read news about the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Greenwall Foundation, and Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky. See descriptions of two policy jobs at health foundations. These tidbits recently came across my desk. •The Greenwall Foundation’s website notes that effective January 1, 2012, its grant making “will focus solely on building and enriching the Greenwall Faculty Scholars Program [...]

The president of the Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation of Massachusetts hits some of the highlights of a recent foundation-supported report on that state’s ongoing health reform effort. Call it what you like—“RomneyCare,” “ObamneyCare,” or plain old Massachusetts Health Reform—it’s working pretty much as intended, at a cost that’s within what was projected, and with [...]

Read about the New York State Health Foundation’s “five-year, $35 million campaign to reverse the diabetes epidemic [in the Empire State] by improving clinical care, sustaining a comprehensive and coordinated care system, and promoting prevention.” The GrantWatch Profile in the January 2012 issue of Health Affairs, titled “New York State Health Foundation’s Diabetes Campaign Is Influencing [...]

The author, a high-ranking official in Colorado’s health department and a family physician in his previous work life, is president and CEO of the Colorado Trust. This statewide health foundation is based in Denver. GrantWatch Blog invited Ned Calonge to reflect on his experiences in the foundation and state government sectors. It’s been a little [...]

We compiled a list of the most-read posts during 2011, in case you missed any of these. The most-read GrantWatch Blog post in 2011 was on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s skill at using social media to communicate with those who follow its activities. And that is not surprising, because of the large population that [...]

On December 14, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released findings from the 2010 National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey. The results may surprise you. For example, over the course of her lifetime, one in four women has been a victim of severe physical violence by an intimate partner. Here is a [...]

In combing through a number of foundation blogs that I follow (as time permits), I found these recent posts, which you may find relevant to your work. The topics covered by these writings range from oral health to the Gates Foundation’s interactions with grantees and on topics from mental health to HIV/AIDS prevention. Bloggers include [...]

Foundations are funding efforts to inform policy makers and others about the status of primary care, to expand access to primary care, and more. The latest issue of Health Affairs contains a sampling of what philanthropy is doing. In case you missed it, read “Foundation Efforts to Meet Demand for Primary Care,” the GrantWatch column [...]

GrantWatch Blog invited Sandra Shewry, the California HealthCare Foundation’s director of state health policy, to report on an event held recently in Sacramento, California. Those working in state health agencies and foundations should be interested in this report.    Like a visiting football coach brought in to invigorate the local team, Todd Park, chief technology officer for [...]

There is quite a bit of news of foundation people, including the announced retirement of Karen Davis from the Commonwealth Fund (a year from now), so we are trying to catch you up now. Watch for more people news in the February print issue of Health Affairs. Kathy Annette started her new position as president [...]

Overuse of antibiotics and antibiotic resistance are serious problems that many people seem unaware of. Witness those who go into a physician’s office with a bad cold and insist upon being prescribed an antibiotic. A cold is caused by a virus, and antibiotics are ineffective on viruses. In today’s post, GrantWatch Blog looks at some [...]

On World AIDS Day, GrantWatch Blog looks at what foundations have been saying and doing about HIV/AIDS in the past month or so. In 2011, HIV/AIDS watchers marked thirty years since the first case was reported in the United States, believe it or not! Of course, this post describes just a sampling of recent activity [...]

Over the past month, health funders have released several polls providing insights on how the public and opinion leaders are now viewing the health system, the roll out of national health reform, and the role of government in the health sector. Nine of ten leaders in health care and health care policy believe it is [...]

Check these out in case you missed them when they first came out on GrantWatch Blog. 1. “Rural Health: Report from the Kentucky Health Policy Forum,” by Susan Zepeda and Amy Watts (September 23). Once again, this post by two staffers at the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, in Louisville, made the most-read list. This [...]

Grantmakers In Health’s Fall Forum, held in Washington, DC, included a well-attended one-day issue dialogue on the health care safety net. Following are a few highlights from speakers’ remarks and the subsequent Q & A session. To start off the day, well-known analysts Leighton Ku of the George Washington University (GWU) and Bruce Siegel of [...]

More and more foundations, it seems, are interested in oral health these days. The topic generated some buzz at a Grantmakers In Health meeting earlier this month, I noticed. The November issue of Health Affairs, just released this week, has a peer-reviewed GrantWatch paper on oral health care for children. Its abstract is free to [...]