“Having access to health insurance is slowing the rate of young adults who head to the emergency department for care, a new study suggests. Relative use of the ED decreased among 19- to-25-year-olds after the healthcare reform law allowed them to stay on their parents’ policies. The authors say the results show insurance can reduce ED overuse by removing the economic barriers to preventive care.
“It’s possible that when people have healthcare insurance they are less worried about the financial costs of care,” said Tina Hernandez-Boussard, assistant professor of surgery and biomedical informatics at Stanford University and lead author of a study published Monday in the journal Health Affairs. “They might seek appropriate care elsewhere and take care of conditions earlier. This could lead to a reduction in utilization of the emergency department.””
“Allowing young adults to stay on their parents’ health plans is one of the most popular elements of the president’s health-care law, but a pair of new studies out today raises questions about the overall impact of the coverage expansion to an estimated 3 million people.
The provision, which allows young adults to stay on their parents’ health insurance plans until their 26th birthday, was one of the earliest parts of the law to take effect, in 2010, and researchers are now starting to report on the effects of that expansion. As expected, it increased the rate of health insurance among young adults, who historically had the highest uninsured rates of any age group. But the provision didn’t change whether the age group perceived themselves as healthier or whether they thought health care was any more affordable, according to a new study in JAMA Pediatrics.”
“Consumers may soon find a surprise in their mailbox: a notice that their health plan is being canceled.
Last year, many consumers who thought their health plans would be canceled because they didn’t meet the standards of the health law got a reprieve. Following stinging criticism for appearing to renege on a promise that people who liked their existing plans could keep them, President Barack Obama backed off plans to require all individual and small group plans that had not been in place before the health law to meet new standards starting in 2014. The administration initially announced a transitional policy that, with state approval, would allow insurers to renew plans that didn’t comply with coverage or cost standards starting in December 2013 and continue doing so until October 2014. Then in March, the administration said it would extend the transitional policy for two more years, meaning that some people will be able to hang onto their non-compliant plans through 2017.”
“In 2002, in a modification of the primary healthcare information privacy rule under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, HHS removed patient consent as a requirement for the release and disclosure of patient information for most common uses. In so doing, HHS gave a regulatory green light to electronic health data disclosures.
Twelve years later, it looks as if Apple is laying down a big bet in the opposite direction by placing consent-management restrictions on developers who plan to use its HealthKit mobile application platform, which is expected to be part of its new operating system to be released later this month, according to published reports.
According to the Guardian, which quotes as its primary source an article in the Financial Times, Apple has informed developers that they “’must not sell an end-user’s health information collected through the HealthKit APIs to advertising platforms, data brokers or information resellers.””
“The District of Columbia U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington on Thursday said the full 11-member court will rehear (PDF) the controversial case that ruled Americans could not receive subsidies to help pay for plans on federally run health insurance exchanges. Oral arguments will begin Dec. 17.
The court’s decision to rehear the case en banc, which experts said is rare for the D.C. appellate court, vacates the judgment issued earlier this summer. On July 22, a three-judge panel ruled 2-1 in Halbig v. Burwell that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act forbade people with lower incomes from receiving tax subsidies from insurance marketplaces run by the federal government, effectively making those subsidies illegal in 36 states.
Opponents of the Affordable Care Act greeted the D.C. court’s initial ruling with praise, saying the judges upheld the text of the law. The law’s supporters, however, argued the court read the text too narrowly and applied an unreasonable and inaccurate interpretation of exchange subsidies.
The July ruling dealt a fresh blow to President Barack Obama’s healthcare law, which relies on the insurance subsidies to make coverage more affordable for millions of people. However, the Obama administration vowed at the time to petition for a full court review of the decision.”
“Federal officials are floating the idea of expanding Medicare’s Pioneer model for accountable care organizations, but they might struggle to recruit any new participants.
Some prominent ACO leaders shared their skepticism in letters to the CMS that the agency released this month. The program, designed and administered by the CMS Innovation Center, is the government’s earliest and most aggressive test under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of new financial incentives for hospitals and doctors to hold down medical costs and meet quality targets.
The Pioneer initiative’s rules put doctors and hospitals at too much risk of losing money with too little control, officials with Universal American, CHE Trinity Health, St. Vincent’s Health Partners, the Franciscan Alliance and others said in the comment letters to federal officials.
Pioneers must agree to accept potential losses with the promise of bonuses after the first year. ACOs participating in the Medicare shared-savings program, in contrast, can go three years without the risk of owing Medicare money if they fall short.
“Organizations are not gravitating toward the Pioneer ACO model because the downside risk is not outweighed by the opportunity for economic gain—the business case is not compelling,” wrote officials with CHE Trinity Health, a Michigan-based system. The system’s CEO is Dr. Richard Gilfillan, who oversaw the launch of Pioneer ACOs as the Innovation Center’s director before his departure last June.”
“Unhappy with the choices her insurance broker was offering, Denver publishing company owner Rebecca Askew went to Colorado’s small business health insurance exchange last fall. She found exactly what she’d been hoping for: affordable insurance options tailored to the diverse needs of her 12 employees.
But Askew is in a tiny minority. Only 2 percent of all eligible businesses have checked out so-called SHOP (Small Business Health Options Program) exchanges in the 15 states where they have been available since last October under the Affordable Care Act. Even fewer purchased policies.
In November, three more state-run SHOP exchanges are slated to open, and the federal government will unveil exchanges for the 32 states that chose not to run their own.
SHOP exchanges were supposed to open nationwide on Oct. 1, the same day as exchanges offering health insurance for individuals. But the Obama administration postponed the SHOP launch, citing the need to fix serious technical problems with the exchanges for individuals, which it said were a higher priority.”
“From Halbig to Sovaldi, this summer was a busy one for health policy and politics. We’ve made it easy to catch up, collecting all of the top stories you clicked on over the past few months. Together, they tell a story about the state of healthcare in the U.S., and offer clues as to where things may be headed when Congress returns in the fall.
Among them: The political battle over Obmacare has become more complicated for Republicans since the government cleaned up the Healthcare.gov mess, and with midterm elections around the corner, the focus will be on how much either party continues to attack or ignore the law. There are policy, legal and business matters to be settled as well – the employer mandate is under attack from the left and the right, the courts have been a wildcard for the health law to this point and could continue to be so, and employers and employees are finding themselves wading through the on-the-ground impacts of the law. That doesn’t even get to our top three storylines of the summer, so be sure to click through to find out what tops the list.”
“Health insurance companies, now required to spend the lion’s share of premium revenue on patient care, are looking for higher investment returns elsewhere. As a result, they’re increasingly putting money into technology ventures where they expect to realize higher returns.
The medical-loss ratio standard under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act requires insurers to spend at least 80% of what they earn from premiums on patient care and related quality improvements. No more than 20% can be used for administrative, marketing and business expenses. The requirement is as high as 85% for large group plans.
Tied to that, insurers are trying to maximize their investment returns while also investing in businesses that are exempt from the 80/20 rule. Technology operations check off both those boxes for them.
“That’s been a catalyst for a substantial amount of investment,” said Joshua Kaye, a Miami-based partner at law firm DLA Piper. “We’re really seeing it on a national scale. Many insurers view health IT as being on the cutting edge.””
“Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU) is restricting student work because of compliance issues associated with the Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly known as Obamacare.
In an email last week, MTSU President Sidney McPhee explained that “due to our interpretation of the reporting requirements of ACA,” graduate assistants, adjunct faculty members, and resident assistants are barred from working on-campus jobs that exceed 29 hours of work per week.
“[E]ffective beginning with the fall semester, we will no longer allow part-time employees, or those receiving monthly stipends from the university, to accept multiple work assignments on campus.” Tweet This
Now, they cannot take on multiple campus jobs.
“[E]ffective beginning with the fall semester, we will no longer allow part-time employees, or those receiving monthly stipends from the university, to accept multiple work assignments on campus,” the email stated.
McPhee noted that violations of the law “could add up as high as $6 million” in penalties.”