Five months after President Obama's inauguration, healthcare dominates the domestic agenda. Any package that emerges could bring sweeping changes, requiring that everyone be insured, creating a government health plan to compete with commercial carriers, and perhaps taxing employer-provided health benefits. But students of history realize we are only now entering the riskiest phase, when real details begin to generate real opposition, according to this New York Times article.
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said he has completed work in transforming health insurers' "conflict-of-interest-ridden system" for reimbursing patients who seek out-of-network medical care and announced a new state regulation codifying those changes. Insurer Health Net has agreed to stop using UnitedHealth's Ingenix database for used to calculate "reasonable and customary" fees for out-of-network payments. The company also agreed to contribute $1.6 million toward the creation of a new database. Cuomo called it the "final agreement" in the series of announcements about insurers agreeing to change the way they calculate payments for people who get healthcare from out-of-network providers.
St. Rose Hospital of Hayward (CA) will today celebrate a $42 million expansion that it funded with a state-backed bond sale. The offering, which closed at the end of May, is the first such deal in California since the financial crisis erupted in September. Plans include a seismic retrofit, 30 new hospital beds and equipment and technology upgrades at the hospital.
Atlanta-based WellStar Health System has sent 14,000 letters to patients saying it may terminate its relationship with Aetna insurance company. WellStar senior vice president of managed care Barbara Corey told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in an email that the letter was intended "to ensure continuity of care and provide information needed to patients to make upcoming benefit decisions, if applicable."
The Florida Legislature's watchdog agency has recommended against expanding an experimental Medicaid program, once touted by former Gov. Jeb Bush as a national model, unless more data can be obtained. The Office of Program Policy Analysis & Government Accountability issued a final report saying little data is available to show the pilot program that uses private health management companies has improved access to medical care or its quality since its October 2006 launch.
Miami-based Jackson Health System is in "preliminary discussions" to transfer or sell its six primary care clinics to some other entity.
Thresia Gambon, interim associate chief medical officer, said that no details have been worked out about what entity might take over the clinics, but the primary motivation was to "continue to provide quality care."