The independent source for health policy research, polling, and news.
The U.S. airwaves are full of political ads these days slamming the Canadian health care system. The ads say that in Canada, care is delayed or denied and some patients can wait a year for vital surgeries. Is the Canadian system really that bad?
As congressional legislation takes shape, most of the major health care players – hospitals, doctors, nursing homes, health insurers and pharmaceutical companies – are likely to benefit over the long term.
Today’s Health on the Hill is mostly about health off the Hill. Jackie Judd talks with Politico’s Carrie Budoff Brown about the contentious town hall meetings and how the lawmakers are preparing themselves for questions. The White House has launched a Web site to try to correct false rumors and to push the President’s agenda on health reform.
Today’s Health on the Hill is mostly about health off the Hill. Jackie Judd talks with Politico’s Carrie Budoff Brown about the contentious town hall meetings and how the lawmakers are preparing themselves for questions. The White House has launched a Web site to try to correct false rumors and to push the President’s agenda on health reform.
As President Obama and Congress struggle to bend the rising cost curve in order to make health care available to all Americans, the history of the first great expansion of health care coverage when Lyndon Johnson drove Medicare and Medicaid through Congress in 1965 offers some critical lessons.
A lot of misinformation is being generated by both ends of the political spectrum about legislation to overhaul the health care system. Bill Adair, editor of the nonpartisan Web site PolitiFact, spoke with All Things Considered’s Melissa Block to sort out the claims. This story comes from our partner
In Seattle, three major hospital systems have sophisticated electronic medical records, one of the many goals of health reform. But the systems can’t talk to each other. Overcoming the obstacles will take ‘federal will and money.’
President Barack Obama devoted his weekly radio and internet address to the subject of health reform.
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said Friday in a conference call with members of the Service Employees Internation Union that some people protesting at town hall meetings around America are trying to silence the health care debate.
At town hall meetings across the U.S., congressional Democrats have met with unruly crowds ready to voice their concerns over the health care overhaul. Even Alabama’s conservative Democrats, who oppose the current legislation, haven’t escaped the wrath. This story comes from our partner
As the economy has worsened, community health centers – which provide free and reduced-cost care to millions of Americans – have felt the pinch . Facilities, such as the Walker-Jones Health Center in Washington D.C., will have even more patients if Congress passes a health overhaul that expands coverage.
Across the country, doctors are experimenting with a health care model that puts the focus on individualized, preventive care. In so-called medical homes, doctors are rewarded for using longer visits, phone calls and e-mails to keep patients healthy. This story comes from our partner
While health reform legislation includes additional funds for community health centers, proposals to expand health coverage to the underserved and uninsured could overwhelm facilities that already provide reduced-cost care to 18 million people.
John Castellani, president of Business Roundtable, said in a conference call Thursday morning that his group is seeking a health care reform bill that is funded largely through cost savings inside the system, preserves ERISA and stops cost-shifting.
If the possibility of lesser reform doesn’t motivate liberals, then maybe something else will: the possibility of no reform.
In just the last few weeks, Karen Ignagni, the health industry’s chief lobbyist, has faced Democratic accusations that insurers are “villains” and “immoral.” In an interview with KHN, Ignagni discussed her take on the Democratic political assault, her industry’s end-game strategy and her unflagging opposition to a public plan.
Some Massachusetts policymakers want to end the tradition of paying health care providers a separate fee for every service they provide. They say paying fees for every visit, test and procedure ordered is the main reason Massachusetts’ health care costs are the highest in the nation. This story comes from our partner
For the tens of thousands of individual insurance agents nationwide, proposed changes to the health care system could radically alter how they do business.
In interviews, two agents talk about how they are bracing themselves for the post-reform environment. One thinks her fellow agents are too complacent, the other says “in every adversity, there is opportunity.”
A trade group says insurers only make 1 cent off every dollar spent on health care. But that figure measures insurer profits against all the money pumped into the U.S. system. Economists say profits are traditionally calculated by how much insurers spend versus how much money they take in.
On a conference call with reporters Tuesday morning, Karen Ignagni, President and CEO of America’s Health Insurance Plans, said the “Washington politics as usual” of finger pointing at health insurers is hurting the process of trying to forge consensus on health reform.
