HHS Gives States Major Grants for Exchange Development

Overall $241M given to seven states including $48M to Oklahoma:

http://www.commonwealthfund.org/Content/Newsletters/Washington-Health-Policy-in-Review/2011/Feb/February-22-2011/Exchange-Innovator.aspx

Employees Trust Their Employers for Good health Info

This surprises me:

http://www.businessgrouphealth.org/pressrelease.cfm?ID=168

The Shift Towards Individual Coverage

With the subsidies available to low-income employees and the elimination of medical underwriting, some predict the group market will shrink dramatically by 2017. What is at stake? About $1T in premium according to this article:

http://www.deloitte.com/view/en_US/us/Insights/Browse-by-Content-Type/deloitte-debates/86c13c8443a2e210VgnVCM2000001b56f00aRCRD.htm?id=us_email_debates_021711

Value Based Benefit Designs: Do They Work?

Value based benefit designs inherently make sense but do they save money? According to this article the jury is still out. But from what I have seen most of the studies focus on self-funded groups not smaller fully insured ones. Given that the positive results of such a design take at least two years to appear, offering the concept to small employers who can switch carriers from year to year can be pointless:

http://www.healthleadersmedia.com/page-3/HEP-262708/ValueBased-Benefits-Are-We-There-Yet

MA Moves Towards Global payment to Reduce HC Costs

The governor is introducing legislation today that gives the insurance commissioner the right to review the contracts between providers and insurers when considering their premium increases. It will also move its Medicaid program towards the concept of global payments.

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/articles/2011/02/17/patrick_proposes_health_fee_overhaul/?p1=Well_MostPop_Emailed2

Good Analysis of Proposed HHS Budget

Winners include:

NIH. The National Institutes of Health receives a $740 million dollar increase with an emphasis on new discoveries and personalized medicine.

Medical Malpractice Reform. The President has emphasized this point before and has included $250 million in the Department of Justice budget to implement and build on existing state pilots. This will be received very well in the Republican Congress but the Democratically controlled Senate will likely have a difficult time supporting bolder language. The Simpson-Bowles commission offered a package of ideas on this front, such as establishing special “health courts” and allowing a safe harbor for providers who follow medical best practices. This leads to a projected savings $17 billion through 2020.

CDC — Consolidated and Reformed Chronic Disease Program. The Administration creates a new Comprehensive Chronic Disease Prevention Program (CCDPP) by consolidating the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Heart Disease and Stroke, Diabetes, Cancer, Arthritis and other Conditions, Nutrition, Health Promotion, and Prevention Centers, along with select school health activities, into one competitive grant program. This will finally coordinate federal efforts around chronic disease, creating a virtual “medical home” of sorts within HHS.

Two-year Doc Fix. This averts an almost 30 percent cut to Medicare rates for physicians for the next 24 months with offsets from lowering a Medicaid provider tax threshold in 2015, estimated to save $18 billion, and by increasin

http://healthaffairs.org/blog/2011/02/14/health-care-in-the-2012-budget-looking-forward-and-backward/

Kansas to Receive $31M from HHS to Develop Health Exchange

This is interesting because the Governor has come out against the ACA:

http://www.thenewstribune.com/2011/02/16/1546817/once-in-a-while-theres-only-one.html

Group Health: The Original HC Cooperative

There is a $6B fund established as part of the ACA to help form health care cooperatives. This is a good interview with the CEO of Group Health in Seattle on how his organization looks to reduce costs and maintain quality:

http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Multimedia/2011/February/021411-health-co-ops-group-health-armstrong.aspx

New Study: High Cost Medicare Patients Are in Bad Health

Previously high cost Medicare areas were deemed to be high cost because of provider induced demand for care. This study says provider supply has nothing to do w/it:

http://www.hschange.org/CONTENT/1185/1185.pdf

Combo Policies: An Alternative to LTC Insurance?

As LTC insurance becomes more and more expensive, More companies are offering riders to their life insurance coverage that will pay for care if the policyholder becomes disabled:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704254304576116342486619476.html

Who Is to Blame for Increasing HC Costs?

Providers blame insurers and insurers blame providers. Personally I think providers are more to blame as well as the general public for not taking better care of themselves. This article looks at both sides:

http://www.healthleadersmedia.com/content/HEP-262396/High-Healthcare-Costs-Continue-to-Provoke-Finger-Pointing.html

BCBS of MA "Cost Effective" Provider Plan Popular

And the providers who are not "cost effective" such as teaching hospitals are not happy about it:

http://www.boston.com/business/healthcare/articles/2011/02/10/plans_steer_patients_to_lower_cost_hospitals/?p1=Well_MostPop_Emailed1

VT Governor Proposes Single Payer Plan for State Residents

Perhaps if Vermont pulls this off other states will seriously consider it?

http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2011/February/08/vermont-governor-shumlin-single-payer.aspx

ACOs: Don't Forget the patients

Good article on how ACOs will look like the second coming of HMOs to most consumers. So what needs to be done to prevent this?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/27/health/views/27chen.html?_r=1

Is the CMS Actuary Correct?

This is a good column on Richard Foster's recent testimony on what the ACA will do to health care costs:

http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Columns/2011/February/020311cohn.aspx