Amid further delays for consumers, California's two largest health insurers extended payment deadlines once more for people who signed up for Jan. 1 coverage through the Covered California exchange. Anthem Blue Cross, a unit of industry giant WellPoint Inc., said it is giving new enrollees until Jan. 31 to pay their first month's premium. Kaiser Permanente, the state's largest HMO, extended the deadline to Jan. 22. Wednesday remains the official deadline for other policies purchased through the Covered California exchange, but its 11 insurers are free to grant extra time, and customers are urged to check with their specific health plan. These new dates also apply to coverage bought outside the exchange.
As legislators grilled Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown on Tuesday over the dismal debut of Maryland's health insurance exchange, the O'Malley administration stood by the website and said it will not switch to the federal version. Rejecting calls to shut down the state's bug-ridden website, Gov. Martin O'Malley's office issued a statement saying the state would keep it running while working to improve it for at least the next 21/2 months. The exchange was created to implement the federal Affordable Care Act and give Marylanders a place to buy health plans or enroll in Medicaid.
The Food and Drug Administration has asked doctors, dentists, pharmacists and other healthcare professionals to stop giving patients high-dose acetaminophen, the active ingredient in the popular pain-reliever Tylenol. Pills, capsules, tablets, syrups and other formulations that contain more than 325 milligrams of acetaminophen have not been shown to reduce pain better than lower doses of the medication; however, such high levels of the drug can cause liver damage, the FDA explained in a recommendation issued Tuesday. Pharmacists who are asked to fill prescriptions for medications with more than 325 mg of acetaminophen should contact the doctor or dentist who ordered it and see if a lower dose would suffice, the recommendation said.
Doug Hawthorne, the longtime chief executive officer of Arlington-based Texas Health Resources, announced his intention to step down as leader of the North Texas hospital company by the end of the year. Hawthorne, 66, has been CEO since Texas Health Resources was created in 1997 through the merger of Presbyterian Healthcare Resources in Dallas, Harris Methodist Health System in Fort Worth and Arlington Memorial Hospital. At the time, Hawthorne was president and CEO of Presbyterian Healthcare. "For 43 years, my family and I have been blessed to serve Texas Health Resources," Hawthorne said in a letter to the board and other leaders of Texas Health. "This has been an amazing journey and one for which I am extremely grateful."
Millions of Americans will get health insurance through the Affordable Care Act that will protect them from potentially ruinous medical expenses, but a new USA TODAY analysis shows the health plans they can choose still leave them vulnerable to thousands in deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs each year. Medical insurance deductibles for plans on the federal exchange covering 34 states average $3,000, and those for the least expensive, bronze-level plans average $5,082, according to the USA TODAY analysis of deductible data for HealthCare.gov. Those costs, according to a recent study, may still be more than many people can afford.
As health insurance companies shift more financial responsibility onto consumers through higher deductibles, co-payments and co-insurance rates, hospital executives are feeling pressure to reveal their most closely-held secret: prices. On Tuesday, Miami Children's Hospital became one of the first in South Florida to give consumers more information — but not exactly the prices — they need to estimate their out-of-pocket costs, an increasingly important factor when deciding where to seek medical care. Hospital executives reduced by 30 percent the theoretical prices on chargemasters, the pricing documents that detail all the related charges a patient runs up for services but not the amounts most people actually pay.