Latest California Healthline Stories
Policy, Not Punditry: Update on Three Key Provisions
Speculation over the midterm elections’ effect on health reform has threatened to overshadow recent regulatory developments. Work to date on high-risk insurance pools, medical-loss ratios and accountable care organizations shows there are roadblocks beyond politics that could hamper reform.
California Hospitals Begin Submitting Reports on Compliance With Seismic Safety Standards
Paul Coleman of OSHPD, Roger Richter of the California Hospital Association and former RAND researcher Charles Meade spoke with California Healthline about hospitals’ efforts to meet state earthquake safety standards.
Overuse of Health Services May Be a Myth
This week, at the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association in Denver, researchers analyzed survey data from California — investigating the concern that immigrants are a major drain on health care services.
“People looked at immigrants and undocumented workers and their use of emergency services and preventive care, and found that those groups are actually less likely than other groups to use health care services,” according to David Grant, director of the California Health Interview Survey.
“The data show [lower usage] of emergency services, as well as lower usage of preventive medicine, even among immigrants who have insurance,” he said.
Healthy Interest in Reform from Small Businesses
California’s small businesses are embracing the tenets of health care reform, according to John Arensmeyer, CEO of the Small Business Majority.
“The more people learn about it, particularly about the tax credits [offered by the Affordable Care Act], the more interested they are,” Arensmeyer said. “The real problem is that it’s a little unknown, so it’s important to get people to understand what’s in it.
According to a recent report by Bernstein Research in New York, more small-business employers — those with three to nine workers — are offering health insurance this year. Nationally, the number of small businesses offering insurance increased by 13 percentage points in a year, from 46% to 59%.
Urgent Care Clinics Arrive With Mixed Reviews in San Diego
The country’s only national urgent care franchise, Doctors Express, opened its first California-based center in San Diego this fall, with a second on its way in early 2011. Not everyone is convinced the new centers will provide much-needed relief to local emergency departments.
Primary Care Might Get its Due With Health Reform
It’s hard to delineate the possible progress being made in fixing the primary care problem in California and the nation, without first looking at how bad that problem is, according to Kevin Grumbach of the UCSF Department of Family and Community Medicine, who addressed an audience of health professionals at UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento this week.
“Health systems and regions built with primary care have better outcomes, better quality of care, lower costs and more equitable care,” Grumbach said.
“The trouble is, we’re finding that the whole foundation of primary care is crumbling.”
New Commissioner Eager To Get Started
The role of California’s insurance commissioner will change quite a bit during the current term. It’s a job that oversees a huge agency, with 1,300 employees charged with evaluating, regulating and policing the home, car and other insurance industries in California. Its approach to health care insurers, though, historically has been different than its authority over other insurance industries. That is about to change and expand in several ways.
After Tuesday’s election, the new commissioner, Dave Jones, said he is “eager and excited” to oversee those changes.
“I’m looking forward to all of it,” Jones said. “I’m excited at the prospect of making this office the state’s most important consumer protection agency. And I’m excited at the prospect of playing a leadership role in implementing health care reform in California.”
Should Hospital Charges Be More Transparent?
A couple of recent efforts to increase pricing transparency in California hospitals have stalled. We asked stakeholders whether the public should have more access to hospital prices.
New Waiver Sets Bar High for Other States
“It was a long wait,” Norman Williams of the state’s Department of Health Care Services said with a slight sigh. “But it was worth it. This is a good day for California.”
Williams is talking about the Medicaid waiver, which sets the structure and facilitation requirements for California’s Medi-Cal program. The waiver is worth up to $2 billion a year in federal funding to California for the next five years. This waiver is a huge accomplishment, Williams said, because it takes all the elements of national health care reform, and puts them into practical use.
“This is such an important step,” Williams said, “because it allows us to completely restructure California’s health care system, and to rein in costs in Medi-Cal.”
What’s on Tap for Reform Before Next Congress Takes Over
As Congress enters a lame-duck session, lawmakers face several pieces of health reform-related legislation. Some Democrats may also weigh using the final days of their House majority to enact their own fixes to health reform.