http://www.beckershospitalreview.com/finance/medicare-audits-ups-936-in-last-five-years.html
Monthly Archives: September 2016
This is how the presidential election is shaping the ongoing drug price debate
This is how the presidential election is shaping the ongoing drug price debate
In this year’s presidential campaign, health care has taken a back seat. But one issue appears to be breaking through: the rising cost of prescription drugs.
The blockbuster drugs to treat hepatitis C as well as dramatic price increases on older drugs, most recently the EpiPen allergy treatment, have combined to put the issue back on the front burner.
Democrat Hillary Clinton just issued a lengthy proposal to address what her campaign calls “unjustified price hikes for long-available drugs.” That’s in addition to a broader proposal to address high drug prices the campaign put out last fall.
Republican Donald Trump, meanwhile, has said little about health care since announcing his candidacy in 2015, but he has several times called for a change in law to allow Medicare to negotiate drug prices for the population it serves.
Here are five reasons why this issue is back — and why it is so difficult to solve.
Editor’s Corner: Geisinger’s new-school/old-school approach to retain, recruit staff
“You can give out bonuses, trinkets, t-shirts and keychains. But at the end of the day people want to be listened to and feel valued, respected and cared for by their colleagues and the leadership team.”
‘Bedless’ hospitals grow as industry moves toward outpatient care
The changing nature of healthcare and patients’ desire for convenience have given rise to nontraditional care formats such as stand-alone emergency rooms and “micro-hospitals,” and now “bedless hospitals” are joining the push.
Such hospitals still have standard hospital features, including infusion suites, emergency rooms, helipads and operating areas, but no overnight space, according to STAT. For example, MetroHealth System recently opened a $48 million bedless facility in the Cleveland area. CEO Akram Boutros, M.D., said staff is expecting to serve around 3,000 patients during this first year.
“It reduces cost, and it reduces the risk of infection,” Boutros told the publication. “People go home to a less-risky environment, where they tend to get better faster.”
Cartoon – Govt Healthcare
Cartoon – Good News, Bad News
Cartoon – Whose getting deep into my pockets?
California Moves to Allow Undocumented Immigrants to Buy Insurance
In a move that is sure to draw the ire of Republicans, California officials are asking the Obama administration this week to approve a plan that would allow undocumented immigrants to buy health insurance on the state’s public exchange.
Officials say that up to 30 percent of the state’s two million undocumented adults could be eligible for the program, and that roughly 17,000 people are expected to participate in the first year, if the plan is approved. But the proposal faces serious hurdles in Washington, where it must be approved by both the Treasury and the Health and Human Services Departments.
During debates over health care in his first term, and again when Congress considered an immigration overhaul in 2013, President Obama made it clear that health insurance subsidies under the Affordable Care Act would not go to immigrants who are living in the United States illegally. And two provisions of the health care law limit coverage to residents who are here legally. But advocates of California’s initiative argue that the plan should be approved under what is known as an “innovation waiver,” which allows states to have provisions of the federal law modified, because no federal dollars will be used to fund the program.
Studies: Employer Costs Slow As Consumers Use Less Care, Deductibles Soar
Employer health insurance expenses continued to rise by relatively low amounts this year, aided by moderate increases in total medical spending but also by workers taking a greater share of the costs, new research shows.
Average premiums for employer-sponsored family coverage rose 3.4 percent for 2016, down from annual increases of nearly twice that much before 2011 and double digits in the early 2000s, according to a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation. (Kaiser Health News is an editorially independent program of the foundation.)
But 3.4 percent is still faster than recent economic growth, which determines the country’s long-run ability to afford health care.
And the tame premium increases obscure out-of-pocket costs that are being loaded on employees in the form of higher deductibles and copayments. Another new study suggests those shifts have prompted workers and their families to use substantially fewer medical services.
For the first time in Kaiser’s annual survey, more than half the workers in plans covering a single person face a deductible of at least $1,000. Deductibles for family plans are typically even higher.
HENRY KOTULA 