Latest California Healthline Stories
Los Angeles County Looks at Plan to Offer Coverage to Home Health Workers
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors has made a “firm commitment” to enroll the county’s uninsured home health care workers in a public health program, the Pasadena Star-News reports.
Alameda Consortium Receives $750,000 Grant to Improve Care for the Uninsured
The Alameda Health Consortium is one of 14 groups nationwide to receive a three-year grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to improve the quality of health care for the county’s uninsured residents, the San Jose Mercury News reports.
‘Radical Changes’ Likely for VA?
Newly appointed Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi “inherits” a health care system where patients often “wait months” for appointments, doctors receive inadequate compensation and “unsupervised” residents treat many patients — but some VA officials predict “radical changes,” the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports.
Bush ‘Forced’ to Enter Patients’ Rights Debate
By placing “[l]ast-minute” Clinton administration Medicaid managed care final regulations on hold, President Bush has “step[ped] quickly” into the patients’ rights debate, the Los Angeles Times reports.
Bipartisan Plan for Medicare Reform Could Be ‘Starting Point’
President Bush “indicated” to some bipartisan congressional members in a “closed-door White House meeting” yesterday that he would favor using the proposal created by the 1999 National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare as a “starting point” for broad-based Medicare reform, CongressDaily reports.
President Bush Offers Plan to Increase ADA Access
President Bush today will announce a $1 billion plan to provide people with disabilities easier access to schools, places of employment and religious institutions, Knight Ridder/Akron Beacon Journal reports.
Democrats Offer Comprehensive Rx Drug Benefit Bill
“[G]earing up for a battle with President Bush” over a Medicare prescription drug benefit, some Democrats have introduced an outline of a bill that not only would provide seniors with a drug benefit, but also would address drug pricing, CongressDaily/A.M.reports.
State Legislature Addresses Problems in Services for Mentally Ill
Following up on a critical mental health report released by the Little Hoover Commission, Assembly member Helen Thomson (D-Davis), chair of the Health Committee, said at a Tuesday hearing that the study, titled “Being There: Making a Commitment to Mental Health”, would be used to institute reform and not be set aside like other studies that have “documented 30 years of broken promises to the mentally ill,” the Scripp-McClatchy/Contra Costa Times reports.
Lawmakers Have ‘Dim View’ of New Medicare Commission
Senators and House members affiliated with 1998’s Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare “take a dim view” of plans to establish a new task force on Medicare — a proposal that President Bush and Senate Finance Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) discussed this week, CongressDaily/A.M. reports.
Report Recommends Patient Privacy Safeguards
A panel of “health experts” yesterday recommended that organizations that share patient-identifiable health information protect confidentiality by establishing voluntary “oversight boards” similar to researchers’ institutional review boards, Newsday reports.