An ailing Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy is trying to lay the groundwork for a breakthrough on healthcare reform next year, though many believe the enormous undertaking has been made even more difficult by the troubled economy. Kennedy, aides say, has held several video conferences with lawmakers and staff in recent months as he fights from home to overcome brain cancer. His staff has held more than a dozen meetings in recent weeks with various advocacy and interest groups that will help influence the debate.
Federal health officials said they will soon address growing concerns about the lucrative commissions that some Medicare insurers plan to pay their agents and brokers this year. Documents obtained from some companies participating in Medicare Advantage show that their agents stand to make $500 to $550 this year for enrolling a beneficiary into one of their plans. In subsequent years, the agents could make another $500 for every year the beneficiary stays with the plan. After five years, an agent could have made more than $2,500, a big jump from previous years.
Americans spend more than $265 billion a year out of pocket on healthcare and pile up medical debt, but now Haddam, CT-based Criterion Ventures is creating a new approach to dealing with world of deductibles, co-pays and care for the uninsured. Criterion's idea is to weave together private and public sources of payment, negotiate discounts on hospital and doctor care, community by community, and load it all onto a hybrid debit-credit card. The card is aimed at insured as well as uninsured consumers.
Richard Berger, MD, of Chicago has a Zimmer Conference Center down the hall from his busy orthopedic office at Rush University Medical Center. He stars in a training video on the Warsaw, IN-based medical device-maker's Web site that shows him installing one of the implantmaker's artificial knees. Berger's experience as a leading expert in Zimmer's development of minimally invasive surgery illustrates the high stakes when doctors and medical-supply firms join in business ventures. Some fellow surgeons say Berger and Zimmer pushed new ideas too far, too fast, before the evidence supported them. But Berger rejects that notion and defends his relationship with Zimmer.
Healthcare stocks have dropped alongside another swoon in the broader market, pouring water on the notion that the industry is a safe place to hide when the economy heads south. Many areas within healthcare are traditionally viewed as economically insulated, and indexes tracking big pharmaceutical and medical-technology companies have declined less precipitously this year than other indexes. But concerns about the harmful impact from higher out-of-pocket patient expenses, or the push toward generic drugs, are taking a toll.
The Food and Drug Administration allows thousands of medical devices onto the market each year after only cursory review and with no clear evidence that they help patients. Doctors are free to use those products as they see fit, without telling patients that the devices are not proved. And because the doctors are frequently paid more by Medicare as a way to compensate them for the extra time and expense of adopting new procedures, these unproven products can become widely adopted. FDA officials defend the quick-review process as a way to promote innovation.