Latest California Healthline Stories
More Seniors Means Greater Elder Abuse
Assembly member Mariko Yamada (D-Davis) cited an interesting statistic during a legislative session on elder abuse yesterday: “We have 10,000 people a day who are turning 65 in this country,” Yamada said.
California has a higher percentage of seniors than other states, she said. “So,” she added, “that means the silver tsunami is here.”
With the increasing numbers of seniors comes an equally increasing need to do something about elder abuse, Assembly member Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco) said.
Altered States: Paths to Reform Increasingly Diverge
Governors in Wisconsin, Alaska and Massachusetts are forging unique paths to custom fit health reform around their budget pressures and existing overhauls. The three states may serve as templates — or outliers — as the rubber starts to hit the road to reform.
Future Uncertain for Adult Day Health Care Services
The verdict is in, and it looks like almost all proposed health services budget cuts have been approved by the budget subcommittees. The biggest dun came at Medi-Cal’s expense — it was cut by $1.5 billion, primarily from lowering the provider reimbursement rate for Medi-Cal by 10%, and by raising rates for patient co-payments.
The largest elements of the new budget plan also call for $1.2 billion to be axed from CalWorks, primarily by shortening the length of time people can be eligible for it, and shifting $1 billion of Prop. 10 money to Medi-Cal.
But one major piece of the health cuts remains undecided.
What Would ACA Repeal Mean for California?
If efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act are successful — either in Congress or the Supreme Court — what happens next in California? We asked stakeholders and policymakers what direction health care reform might take if the current path is blocked.
Physicians Are Insurance Consumers, Too
Since taking office less than two months ago, Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones has made it clear he wants to protect consumers from insurers — and he made moves to get the authority to curb excessive insurance rate hikes and enforce new federal medical loss ratios.
Jones still doesn’t have the rate-regulation authority he said the California Department of Insurance needs, but he does have the enforcement power to go after insurers who don’t meet medical loss ratio standards.
Now Jones’ office is targeting a new type of insurance: medical malpractice.
Every two years, the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research conducts an extensive survey — with a county-by-county breakdown of income, ethnicity and health indicators of Californians.
The California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) is the nation’s largest state survey. Yesterday, the center released its 2009 data, one day after issuing its first policy brief on the data, which looked at the recent rise in how many people will be eligible for Medi-Cal and under national health care reform.
That kind of information is vital in crafting the state’s health policies, according to E. Richard Brown, director of UCLA’s CHPR.
Biomedical Jobs No. 1 in San Diego Health Care Work Force
The recession has brought mixed results for the various sectors of San Diego’s health care labor market. The biomedical industry saw job gains in 2009, while hospitals consolidated or froze jobs. Although nursing graduates are struggling to find work in the region now, hospital officials predict future shortages of nurses and allied health professionals.
About 3 Million New Medi-Cal Enrollees?
The number of Californians who will be eligible to participate in the federal health care coverage expansion in 2014 is higher than previously thought, according to a new study from the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, based on data from the 2009 California Health Interview Survey.
About 4.7 million people will be eligible for the new coverage options, and about 3 million of those people qualify for Medi-Cal, according to Shana Alex Lavarreda, lead author of the UCLA policy brief.
“We were surprised by the number of people eligible for Medi-Cal, about 3 million, under the federal expansion,” Lavarreda said.
What Does Obama’s Budget Hold for Health Reform?
President Obama’s proposed budget would ramp up federal spending on the health reform law in an effort to help carry out its provisions. The proposal has renewed GOP criticism that the White House is overextending the government’s role in health care and is pushing off hard choices on health costs.
Open Enrollment Window Closing
It’s open enrollment season and this year that means a little more in California.
Several state officials and health advocates gathered at UC-Davis Medical Center in Sacramento yesterday, to make sure parents understand there are some new rules about health care for children.
New federal and state legislation means that children with pre-existing conditions cannot be denied coverage, nor billed at excessive rates. And right now is the time to sign up children for coverage, according to Assembly member Mike Feuer, D-Los Angeles.