Tag Archives: medicare

As employers attempt to contain health insurance costs, workers and families struggle too

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Joseph Burns

About Joseph Burns

Joseph Burns (@jburns18), a Massachusetts-based independent journalist, is AHCJ’s topic leader on health insurance. He welcomes questions and suggestions on insurance resources and tip sheets at joseph@healthjournalism.org.

Photo: Pictures of Money via Flickr

One of the largest and most important parts of our health care system is the role employers play in providing health insurance coverage for workers, retirees, and family members. U.S. employers cover 55.1% of Americans who have health insurance, according to a report released by the U.S. Census Bureau.

By providing health insurance for more than half of all Americans, employers pay for the biggest share of health coverage in the United States. Continue reading →

New rule allows Medicare reimbursement to ambulatory surgery centers for knee replacements, stents

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Cheryl Clark

About Cheryl Clark

Cheryl Clark (@CherClarHealth) is AHCJ's core topic leader for patient safety, a MedPage Today contributor and inewsource.org investigative journalist. For most of 27 years, she covered medicine and science for the San Diego Union-Tribune. After taking a buyout in 2008, she became senior quality editor for HealthLeaders Media.

Knee replacement surgeries and stenting procedures will now be reimbursed in free-standing ambulatory surgery centers for Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries as of Jan. 1 under a new rule finalized by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on Friday.

The controversial policy shift will mean hundreds, if not tens of thousands, of older patients will now have these complex procedures in a facility not attached to a hospital, and will go home the same day. Continue reading →

CMS proposal would make knee replacements, stents reimbursable at ambulatory surgery centers

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Cheryl Clark

About Cheryl Clark

Cheryl Clark (@CherClarHealth) is AHCJ's core topic leader for patient safety, a MedPage Today contributor and inewsource.org investigative journalist. For most of 27 years, she covered medicine and science for the San Diego Union-Tribune. After taking a buyout in 2008, she became senior quality editor for HealthLeaders Media.

Who reads Medicare rules?

Nobody, right?

They’re long, boring, hard to read because of the small type in narrow columns and they’re full of repetition and jargon.

But just in case you have a sleepless night, I recommend pulling up proposed or final rules for an IPPS, (inpatient prospective payment system) or an OPPS (outpatient prospective payment system) or a PFS (physician fee schedule), for starters. Continue reading →

Drug pricing bill faces uphill climb in an impeachment-focused Congress

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Liz Seegert

About Liz Seegert

Liz Seegert (@lseegert), is AHCJ’s topic editor on aging. Her work has appeared in NextAvenue.com, Journal of Active Aging, Cancer Today, Kaiser Health News, the Connecticut Health I-Team and other outlets. She is a senior fellow at the Center for Health Policy and Media Engagement at George Washington University and co-produces the HealthCetera podcast.

With the news out of Washington coming at us fast and furiously, it may have been easy to miss the introduction of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s new proposal to curb the cost of prescription drugs.

Drug pricing is an especially important issue for older adults, many of whom are on multiple medications and take more prescription drugs on average than any other age group in the United States, according to the American Geriatrics Society.

Continue reading →

Trump riffs on health at campaign rally

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Joanne Kenen

About Joanne Kenen

Joanne Kenen, (@JoanneKenen) the health editor at Politico, is AHCJ’s topic leader on health reform and curates related material at healthjournalism.org. She welcomes questions and suggestions on health reform resources and tip sheets at joanne@healthjournalism.org. Follow her on Facebook.

Photo: Classic Film via Flickr

President Donald Trump has pledged to unveil a new plan to repeal and replace the ACA – but we haven’t seen it, and it’s not clear that we ever will.  If the president does announce a plan, it’s to campaign on in 2020, not to try to enact before the November elections with a Democratic-controlled House and a divided Senate.

There’s no way to know how the Ukraine scandal will factor into health care and domestic policy. Trump may focus on impeachment and politics to the exclusion of health care – or he may try to change the subject with some kind of health platform. Continue reading →

Poll results support adding dental coverage to Medicare

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Mary Otto

About Mary Otto

Mary Otto, a Washington, D.C.-based freelancer, is AHCJ's topic leader on oral health and the author of "Teeth: The Story of Beauty, Inequality, and the Struggle for Oral Health in America." She can be reached at mary@healthjournalism.org.

Though about 60 million retired and disabled Americans depend upon Medicare for their health care coverage, the federal program has never included routine dental benefits.

A sizeable percentage of likely voters believe that should change, according to the results of a new poll. Continue reading →