Healthcare Finance Staff

New market studies of Sacramento and Riverside/San Bernardino conducted by the Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC) in Washington, D.C., and funded by the California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF), show care costs and physician shortage are increasingly challenging provides in the state.

Editor's note: The following report is published here with permission from the Center for Public Integrity. Electronic medical records, long touted by government officials as a critical tool for cutting health care costs, appear to be prompting some doctors and hospitals to bill higher fees to Medicare for treating seniors.

Officials: Wisconsin will need another $650 million for Medicaid Wisconsin's Department of Health Services submitted a proposal to Gov. Scott Walker for an additional $650 million needed to fund the state's Medicaid program for the next two-year budget cycle.

According to the authors of a new analysis published Wednesday in Health Affairs, there are three overlying lessons for state and federal healthcare policy makers to be learned from Massachusett's healthcare law experiences.

Michigan Governor Rick Snyder wants to turn Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan into a mutual insurance company and bring it under the same laws regulating other insure -- a plan that has company executives shrugging their shoulders.

U.S. Senator John Kerry is sponsoring legislation that would expand Meaningful Use financial incentives for providers that serve predominantly lower-income Americans but don't qualify for the Medicaid EHR incentive program.

  With childrens dental coverage set to expand in the next few years, the dental industry is trying to get a sense of what the dental insurance market, and the state and federal rules impacting it, might look like.

Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR), a global investments firm, and the American Heart Association (AHA) have recently teamed up to launch a new research collaboration to study how effective workplace wellness initiatives have been at KKR and four of its portfolio companies.

Health spending grew 4.2 percent nationally in July relative to July 2011, up from the 3.9 percent growth rate experienced in June, according to the Health Sector Economic Indicators brief released recently by the Altarum Institute's Center for Sustainable Health Spending.

Certifi nabs Utah HIX business "Exchanges are going to come in all shapes and sizes," Jay Belschner, managing partner of the Minnesota-based consulting, software and compliance firm Certifi told the Minneapolis Star Tribune.