Mary Mosquera
Despite the noise around the higher cost of some health plans on the exchanges, rate increases generally have more to do with the trend of steadily higher medical costs than with provisions of the Affordable Care Act.
States that expand their Medicaid program eligibility under the health reform law will incur only modestly higher state costs, about 3 percent, compared with significant increases in federal funds, according to a new report from the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Physicians who treat Medicaid patients will get a pay raise in two months when Medicaid reimbursement rates becoming equal to Medicare reimbursement rates for primary care services.
Patient-centered medical home models have proven that they reduce hospital admission and emergency room use in recent pilots.
Since the announcement that Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan is presidential candidate Mitt Romney's running mate, many of the headlines about the choice have focused on how the author of the House budget plan would upend the Medicare program and upset seniors' certainty about healthcare. Ryan's plans for Medicaid, however, merit some attention because they are more immediate.
The Medicaid expansion was supposed to be the least controversial part of the health reform lawsuit. But since the Supreme Court essentially made broadening its eligibility voluntary for states, not a day goes by without news reports guessing how Medicaid will fare in the future.
CMS fears seniors may not be taking advantage of the information available to them because the process is too complex to navigate.
The Supreme Court ruled that the individual mandate survives as a tax under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
Exclusive of the health reform law, a majority of states have established delivery system qualifications and payment policies to promote Medicaid's medical homes program.
Six states -- Illinois, Nevada, Oregon, South Dakota, Tennessee and Washington -- will receive $181 million in grants from the U.S. Health and Human Services Department to help them establish health insurance exchanges.