Latest From California Healthline:
California Healthline Original Stories
Blue Shield Has Highest Share Of Enrollees In Covered California
Covered California enrollees continue to be among the healthiest in the nation, which exchange officials hope will hold down rate hikes next year. (Chad Terhune and Emily Bazar, )
California To Pay About $1.3 Billion For Medicaid Expansion In First Year Of State Contributions
The payment is only 5 percent of the total cost of Medi-Cal’s expansion this year, but experts say it adds to an already-stretched budget. (Emily Bazar, )
Republicans Race The Clock On Health Care — But The Calendar Is Not Helping
The delays in pushing through a bill to replace Obamacare are beginning to back up other key items on the congressional calendar. (Julie Rovner, )
More News From Across The State
State's Single-Payer Bill Faces Make-Or-Break Hearing With Appropriations Panel
SB 562 would establish a nine-member board to oversee health care in the state and create a trust fund to help pay for the program. What it doesn’t include is a detailed plan to show where the rest of the funds would come from.
KPCC:
Single-Payer Health Care For California Takes The Next Step
California’s latest attempt at creating a state-run health care system faces a critical juncture Monday. Senate Bill 562, titled the Healthy California Act, goes before the state Senate appropriations committee in Sacramento. The bill, which lays out a plan to provide universal single-payer health coverage for California, passed the California Senate health committee in April. (Faust, 5/22)
Orange County Register:
As D.C. Attacks Obamacare, California Takes Steps Toward Single-Payer Health Care
The plan going to the state Senate Appropriations Committee on Monday could cost Californians more and faces substantial hurdles to enact. But it promises to provide everybody in the state — including those here illegally — with care that in most cases would be superior and easier to access than what they have now. “It’s the only way to guarantee health care for every Californian in a sustainable way, especially given efforts in Washington to roll back coverage,” said Michael Lighty, director of public policy for the California Nurses Association. The union is sponsoring the measure. (Wisckol, 5/19)
Thousand Oaks Hospital Faces Elder Abuse Lawsuit
The suit centers around the Los Robles Hospital & Medical Center's treatment of Emanuel Mandelman before his death.
Ventura County Star:
Elder Abuse Suit Filed Against T.O. Hospital
The wife of an 87-year-old man who died at Los Robles Hospital & Medical Center is suing the hospital and its parent corporation, alleging elder abuse and negligent care. Emanuel Mandelman, of Calabasas, died on March 20, 2016, at the Thousand Oaks hospital of pneumonia, more than a month after being admitted and three days after a fall that knocked him unconscious until his death, according to the complaint filed against Los Robles and HCA Management Services. The lawsuit in Ventura County Superior Court alleges the hospital didn't notify Mandelman's family of his fall. (Kisken, 5/21)
In other hospital news —
Ventura County Star:
Simi Valley Hospital Earns Stroke Honors
Simi Valley Hospital received the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association’s Get With the Guidelines-Stroke Gold Plus Quality Achievement Award with Target: Stroke Honor Roll. The award recognizes the hospital’s commitment to providing the most appropriate stroke treatment according to nationally recognized, research-based guidelines based on the latest scientific evidence. (5/19)
The Mercury News:
Stanford Lucile Packard Children's Hospital Debuts New Building In December
The pediatric and obstetric centers of the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford will debut in December, opening its doors to children and expectant mothers at new facilities that more than double the existing campus. In a statement, Susan Packard Orr said that her mother, who founded the hospital, always envisioned the hospital to be a place where children and families receive “truly healing care.” (Lee, 5/19)
Licensing Board Calls Off Massive Audit Of Nursing Credentials
The Board of Vocational Nursing and Psychiatric Technicians' audit drew criticism from lawmakers at a hearing last month where they considered whether to allow the board to continue operating.
Sacramento Bee:
CA Nursing Board Quits Education Audit
A California licensing board curtailed a massive audit of nursing credentials that it launched late last year, choosing not to finish a project that threatened to overwhelm the small department. The Board of Vocational Nursing and Psychiatric Technicians reviewed just 15 percent of the education records it demanded from more than 52,000 nurses and mental health workers last November before it elected to end the audit. (Ashton, 5/19)
Early Intervention In Alzheimer's Can Slow Deterioration
Dr. William Shankle, director of the Memory and Cognitive Disorders program at Hoag Neurosciences Institute in Newport Beach, says that with early treatment, 45 percent of patients have what he calls “a curable condition, they can go on with life as before.”
Orange County Register:
California Doctor Figures Out Way To Stop Alzheimer’s Progression
Like his father before him and millions of others, Ted Esau’s brain started to deteriorate in his late-50s. Plaque was building up. Part of his brain was starting to shrink. Although invisible to everyone including himself, the first stages of Alzheimer’s disease were beginning to take hold. But following a program of healthy eating, exercise, Food and Drug Administration-approved medication and monitoring, Esau is a relatively new phenomenon in the annals of Alzheimer’s — someone who is attacking the disease before it takes away memory and is seeing a halt in the disease’s progression. (Whiting, 5/19)
People In LA Aren't Signing Up For Food Stamps And Officials Want To Fix That
Supervisors Sheila Kuehl and Janice Hahn have introduced a motion that would instruct the Department of Public Social Services to specifically devote resources to signing up residents for the program.
KPCC:
1/3 Of Angelenos Who Qualify For Food Stamps Don't Get Them
About a third of people who qualify for food stamps don't receive them in L.A. County, and officials are trying to figure out why. Only an estimated 66 percent of people who qualify for CalFresh actually enroll in the program in L.A. County, which is below the state average and well below San Bernardino County's 93 percent participation rate. (Palta, 5/19)
In other news from across the state —
Modesto Bee:
Modesto Schools Alert Parents About Norovirus Outbreaks
School districts are notifying parents of possible norovirus outbreaks in the Modesto area. Stanislaus County public health has received a few calls from schools reporting students out with gastrointestinal illness, said Barbara Vassell, communicable disease manager for the county. (Carlson, 5/19)
Trump Budget Slashes Medicaid Funding, Rejecting Some Conservatives' Pleas To Save Expansion
The White House also wants to give states more flexibility when it comes to imposing work requirements for people in the program.
The Washington Post:
Trump To Propose Big Cuts To Safety-Net In New Budget, Slashing Medicaid And Opening Door To Other Limits
President Trump’s first major budget proposal on Tuesday will include massive cuts to Medicaid and call for changes to anti-poverty programs that would give states new power to limit a range of benefits, people familiar with the planning said, despite growing unease in Congress about cutting the safety net. For Medicaid, the state-federal program that provides health care to low-income Americans, Trump’s budget plan would follow through on a bill passed by House Republicans to cut more than $800 billion over 10 years. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that this could cut off Medicaid benefits for about 10 million people over the next decade. (Paletta, 5/21)
In other national health care news —
The Associated Press:
Senate Republicans Quietly Working On Health Overhaul Bill
Remember the Republican health care bill? Washington is fixated on President Donald Trump's firing of FBI chief James Comey and burgeoning investigations into possible connections between Trump's presidential campaign and Russia. But in closed-door meetings, Senate Republicans are trying to write legislation dismantling President Barack Obama's health care law. (Fram, 5/22)
Politico:
Trump Tells Advisers He Wants To End Key Obamacare Subsidies
President Donald Trump has told advisers he wants to end payments of key Obamacare subsidies, a move that could send the health law's insurance markets into a tailspin, according to several sources familiar with the conversations. Many advisers oppose the move because they worry it would backfire politically if people lose their insurance or see huge premium spikes and blame the White House, the sources said. Trump has said that the bold move could force Congressional Democrats to the table to negotiate an Obamacare replacement. (Dawsey, Haberkorn and Demko, 5/19)
USA Today:
Obamacare Subsidies At Stake In Monday Court Hearing
A Monday court hearing offers the Trump administration its best opportunity to prevent significant increases in health care costs for about 7 million lower-income Americans who buy their plans on the Affordable Care Act exchanges. The administration's next move could prevent these insurance marketplaces from imploding as insurers are deciding which states, if any, to sell insurance in and at what price. (O'Donnell, 5/19)
Politico:
McConnell Steps Into Obamacare Firing Line
Mitch McConnell has sidestepped the Russia controversy that’s dogged Donald Trump all year and eluded the wrath rained down on Paul Ryan over the GOP’s Obamacare repeal effort. But the health care reform battle is now squarely in McConnell’s court: He will decide the contents of the Senate’s plan, most likely behind closed doors. And he is on the hook for getting something through a sharply divided Senate Republican Conference in the midst of an increasingly imperiled presidency. (Everett and Haberkorn, 5/21)
The Washington Post:
Nearly 700 Vacancies At CDC Because Of Trump Administration’s Hiring Freeze
Nearly 700 positions are vacant at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention because of a continuing freeze on hiring that officials and researchers say affects programs supporting local and state public health emergency readiness, infectious disease control and chronic disease prevention. The same restriction remains in place throughout the Health and Human Services Department despite the lifting of a government-wide hiring freeze last month. At the National Institutes of Health, staff say clinical work, patient care and recruitment are suffering. (Sun, 5/19)
Stat:
Doctors Have Resisted Guidelines To Treat Sepsis. New Study Suggests Those Guidelines Save Lives
Even in the face of increased pressure from regulators, many doctors have failed to fully embrace early screening and treatment protocols for sepsis, an infection-related complication that afflicts tens of thousands of Americans every year and that can be life-threatening. Skeptics have argued that there haven’t been any comprehensive studies to support the notion that the protocols can actually save lives. On Sunday, however, the New England Journal of Medicine published a large study that could make doctors reconsider — and help hospitals address head-on one of the most common dangers their patients face. (Tedeschi, 5/21)