What Should You be Reading About in Health Policy?

To help stay current with health policy news around the nation, we have links for future reference. Healthcare.gov is a great resource not only to look at insurance options and learn about the health care law, but to also learn about individual states, and how much each state spends on treating chronic disease, and how much money can be saved with prevention initiatives.
Additionally, the repeal of the health care law continues to move forward with the 11th circuit court concluding that the individual mandate is unconstitutional. To read more details on the decision, Kaiser provides a summary and links to the entire decision, The Health Care blog also has a good piece on the effects of the law if the individual mandate is not intact. Some other developments as a result of the health law include an actuarial analysis of the essential health benefits exchange by The National Health Council’s short summary and here is the full study Full study by National Health Council. Also, a study by Study by Avalere.

Another by National Bureau of Economic Research was recently released on an analysis of the Affordable Care Act and the effects of exchanges and employer sponsored insurance.
This past week, the Department of Health and Human Services approved 106 three year waivers from part of health reform, like 1,472 one year waivers were approved earlier this year, read the details. The health insurance exchange rules were released this past August, and you can read the press release here.

Other notable news includes Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services(CMS)’ announcement of the bundled payment concept for care improvement. Read about that CMS is proposing to improve patient care through care coordination and patient-centered approach in the delivery of care.

This past July, The National Bureau of Economic Research, published a study by Amy Finkelstein, Sarah Taubman, Bill Wright, Mira Berstein, Jonathan Gruber, Joseph Newhouse, Heidi Allen, Katherine Baicker (Oregon Health Study Group) on how Medicaid impacts a population. A random group of 10,000(out of the 90,000 that signed up) uninsured low-income adults were selected to participate in the study. This is considered the “gold standard” in medical evidence-effects of insurance. There are also some good editorials by Ezra Klein in the Washington Post and Jonathan Cohn in the New Republic on the Oregon Medicaid study.

Advertisement