Latest California Healthline Stories
Post-Mortem on Physician Hiring Bills
A pilot program that has allowed some direct hiring of physicians in rural areas of California apparently generated a lot of interest in Sacramento. Three different bills were introduced to expand the scope of that pilot program, and all three of those bills failed.
In California, hospitals are not allowed to employ physicians directly, in order to maintain a kind of firewall between hospital administrators and the health care providers who make medical decisions.
But there is also a shortage of primary care physicians in rural areas of the state, so some medical centers were granted an exception to the no-direct-hiring rule, so that they could hire on their own doctor for their own facility. Many hospital administrators felt that suspension of the rule gave them a competitive hiring advantage.
Health IT Moves Forward With Privacy, Consent
ONC’s Health IT Policy Committee recently approved patient privacy recommendations from the privacy and security work group — the Tiger Team — making headway on one of the thorniest issues confronting the growth of electronic records in health care.
Medicaid Waiver Bills Still in Play at Capitol
The legislative deadline passed more than week ago, but at least two health care bills are still at play in the Legislature.
Not only are two bills dealing with Medi-Cal waiver certain to get a vote when the legislature reconvenes to take up the budget, the legislation has several big factors in favor of its passage, according to health care expert Peter Harbage of Harbage Consulting.
“At the end of the day, the policy changes in the waiver and its funding are too valuable for California to pass up.”
End of Session Winners Wait on Governors Desk
The governor is expected to sign legislation into law that would create the state Health Benefits Exchange legislation. He has till the end of September to make up his mind about the exchange and other health care-related issues.
This is some of what’s pending:
• Seven other bills related to the pending federal health care law and coverage issues are before the governor (in addition to the two exchange bills, SB 900 and AB 1602).
L.A., Orange County Weigh Resources To Fight Obesity
As Americans’ girths continue to widen, Los Angeles and Orange County are scaling up interventions to deal with the growing obesity problem that threatens not only the health of California, but its economy, too.
Little Hoover Commission Considers Ways To Optimize California’s Long-Term Care Services
Stuart Drown of the Little Hoover Commission, Eileen Kunz of On Lok PACE Partners, Stephen Moses of the Center for Long-Term Care Reform and Gary Passmore of the Congress of California Seniors discussed long-term care with California Healthline.
California Set To Insure High-Risk Patients
On April 29, Governor Schwarzenegger signed legislation that established the state’s federally funded high-risk insurance pool. This week that insurance pool is accepting its first enrollee applications.
That means the government set up a complicated government program in about four months. In state bureaucracy terms, that is the blink of an eye.
“We’ve been working nights and weekends trying to make this happen,” Deputy Director for Legislative and External Affairs at the Managed Risk Medical Insurance Board Jeanie Esajian said.
Employer System a Shaky Base for Health Reform
The health care overhaul built on the nation’s unique employer-based health insurance system, instead of revamping the model. However, a number of recent shocks to the system are creating new challenges for consumers and raising concerns ahead of coverage expansions in 2014.
How Budget Morass Could Spring One Bill From Limbo
The Assembly and Senate both passed a bill on the last day of the legislative session, but it ended up being put on hold after Republicans closed ranks and refused to approve it on concurrence.
According to the state’s Chief Clerk, E. Dotson Wilson, it is currently the only bill that could get a re-vote when the Legislature gathers to decide on the budget. AB 1542 by Dave Jones (D-Sacramento) would encourage establishment of patient-centered medical homes.
“Because it has an urgency clause, it is eligible to be taken up again when the legislature votes on the budget,” Wilson said. “There is a window there.”
California First With Exchange, but What Will It Look Like?
So far, there are more questions than answers about how California’s proposed Health Benefits Exchange would work. The goal is to pool risk and give the state — and its citizens — more buying power, which may mean lower premium rates and a wider array of choices in health plans.