Policy and Legislation
A physicians commission co-chaired by former Senate majority leader Bill Frist, MD, a Republican and heart surgeon from Tennessee, is calling for the federal government to phase out the fee-for-service payment model within the next decade.
Due to continuing budget gridlock in Washington, sequestration has been triggered – meaning automatic cuts to a wide range of federal programs, including Medicare payments to providers and health plans.
A new series of data briefs prepared by Avalere Health and released by the SCAN Foundation show that seniors enrolled in traditional Medicare who suffer from severe mental illness (SMI) and substance abuse disorder (SUD) cost the program an average of five times more than those without SMI in 2010.
David P. Blom is one of thousands of hospital executives across the country who are bracing for a reduction in Medicare payments as part of a series of federal spending cuts that began March 1. He talked with Kaiser Health News' Mary Agnes Carey about how his company is preparing to deal with sequestration.
Call it a post-reelection prediction: On the day after President Barack Obama secured a second term at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, an attorney for a prominent healthcare law firm suggested that even Republican governors would succumb to the lure of expanding Medicaid on the federal dime.
With the Affordable Care Act's (ACA) expansion of insurance coverage expected to increase the need for primary care services -- requiring an estimated additional 7,200 primary care providers -- 7 million Americans could likely face a primary care physician shortage after 2014.
The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008 went into effect in July 2010 and for the most part, health plans are complying with the legislation and figuring out how to manage costs.
The Department of Health and Human Services has published final rules for essential health benefits and several other policies that clarify rules on mental health benefits.
Florida's GOP Gov. Rick Scott will adopt Medicaid expansion for three years while the federal government pays full freight, and then leave it to state lawmakers to re-authorize it.
Two percent cuts may not sound deep, but the sequester, scheduled to start March 1 unless Congress acts, will be painful, and has the healthcare industry worried.