Latest California Healthline Stories
Exchange Readies Its New Website
Covered California, the new brand name for the state’s health benefit exchange, will unveil its new website next week, according to Oscar Hidalgo, director of communication and public affairs at the exchange.
Hidalgo spoke at last week’s exchange board meeting, presenting one of the first building blocks of the marketing structure, an informational website.
“We are just about to launch a consumer-friendly website at the end of the month,” Hidalgo said. He said the unveiling is expected to be Wednesday or Thursday next week.
The Premium Conundrum: Do Smokers Get a Fair Break Under Obamacare?
Would you quit smoking if you were charged $4,000 more per year for the habit? Some analysts say that a new measure under the Affordable Care Act is overly punitive for tobacco users, while others suggest it’s an overdue approach to take toward smokers.
California Behind National Curve in Care for Chronically Ill Children
California is behind the national curve in caring for chronically ill children, according to a study released last week by the Lucile Packard Foundation for Children’s Health based in Palo Alto.
In particular, the coordination of care and access to specialists for California’s chronically ill children ranks among the worst six states in the nation, according to the study.
Report Shows Central Valley Behind in ACA Preparation
A study examined in a public forum last week finds that health reform implementation in the Fresno region is hindered by poverty, physician shortages, lack of collaboration and bureaucratic barriers.
Covered California Lands $674 Million Federal Grant
Peter Lee could hardly contain himself yesterday.
“In 2010, California was the first state in the nation to say we want a state-based exchange. Then, earlier this month, the federal government approved our blueprint for the exchange,” said Lee, the executive director of the state’s health insurance exchange, Covered California.
“And now,” Lee said, “the feds have given us the resources we need to launch Covered California. This is an historic moment.”
How Will Covered California Service Centers Work?
Service centers — the places where California consumers will be directed through an 800 phone number and a web portal to get answers to their exchange and eligibility questions — are on the agenda at today’s meeting of the Health Benefit Exchange board.
Betsy Imholz, director of the West Coast office of Consumers Union, hopes her questions about service centers will be answered at today’s meeting.
Consumers Union is one of 13 advocacy groups that signed onto a recent letter to the exchange board, asking for assurance that the board hasn’t yet adopted a particular type of protocol model for the service centers, a protocol that Imholz said could discourage people from participating in the exchange.
Should Calif. Be Model for National Mental Health System?
We asked mental health experts and lawmakers how California and the nation should respond to the public debate triggered by the killing of 26 people at an elementary school last month. Senate President Pro Tempore Darrell Steinberg has urged the White House to use California’s mental health system as a national model.
Assembly Hearing Addresses Issues of Risk
It was not your usual subject for an Assembly hearing in the Capitol Building.
Yesterday’s hearing convened by the Assembly Committee on Health took on the arcane and important subject of adverse selection and risk pools. The nerdy-tech tone of the hearing was not lost on its participants.
“I have to applaud the committee — for taking on such a dry topic,” said David Panush, director of government relations for Covered California, the state’s health exchange. “But it is so important. I’m really glad to see it.”
Inside Three ACOs: Why California Providers are Opting for the Model
Nine organizations named among the latest round of participants in the Medicare Shared Savings Program will serve patients in the Golden State. Administrators of several new ACOs explain why they joined the program.
Provider Rate Cut Case May Linger
The state budget proposed by Gov. Brown counts on $488.4 million in savings from rate reductions to Medi-Cal providers in keeping with a law passed in 2011 that hasn’t yet been implemented because it’s been held up in court.
Last month, a three-judge panel in federal Circuit Court overruled previous injunctions issued by federal appellate judges. However, the injunctions will remain in place and provider reimbursements won’t be cut at least until the end of this month. Litigants in each of the four lawsuits have until Jan. 28 to file a re-hearing request.
At least one of those litigants — the California Hospital Association — is going to file a re-hearing request, according to Jan Emerson-Shea, CHA’s vice president of external affairs.