Latest California Healthline Stories
High-Risk Insurance Plan About To Start
Originally, the Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan was going to cover high-risk patients by the end of September. That start-up date was pushed forward to Oct. 7, and now it’s on an any-day-now status.
“We’re still working with vendors to finalize the contracts,” Jeanie Esajian of the PCIP said. “It’s a very complex process. All I can tell you is, it could be any day now that we announce coverage to begin.”
PCIP is a state-run, federally funded high-risk insurance plan for patients who have been unable to obtain health care coverage because of pre-existing conditions. Under the rules of national health care reform, due to go into effect by 2014, insurance companies will no longer be allowed to prevent individuals with pre-existing conditions from obtaining coverage.
Electronic Records Revolution About To Hit?
With all the talk about implementing electronic health records throughout California’s health care centers, you would think technology is now part of the health infrastructure. But adoption of EHRs by physicians and hospitals is far from ubiquitous in the state, according to Larry Dickey, medical director at the Office of Health Information Technology, in the state’s Department of Health Care Services.
The data are not good on just how many physicians have implemented EHRs so far, Dickey said, but it’s clear that a large number of private clinicians do not have them.
“The larger physician groups are more likely to have them than the solo practitioners,” Dickey said. Hospitals, “where you would expect much higher numbers,” Dickey said, are still lagging. Dickey said “45% of hospitals have no electronic health record at all.”
Stem Cell Research Agency Gets OK To Expand
Former state Senate member Art Torres appeared yesterday at the strategic review hearing for the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine.
Torres, vice chair at CIRM, testified before the eight-member panel of experts convening this week to review the agency’s strategic plan.
Torres helped shepherd a bill through the legislative process this year that was recently signed by the governor.
International Leader Status Could Aid Californians
This year marks the third anniversary of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine’s strategic plan. The organization is required by law at that point to re-evaluate what it’s doing and how it hopes to accomplish its goals.
An eight-person panel convened in San Francisco yesterday to do just that, and that panel of outside experts will continue to meet with CIRM staff today and tomorrow, as well. Public comment at the meetings is welcomed.
California has become a world leader in stem cell research, in part because President Bush stopped the flow of federal dollars for this type of research, and California voters respondied by creating and funding CIRM, to the tune of $3 billion. The agency has invested about $1 billion of that money so far.
Preparing for Medi-Cal Transition
State and federal officials are busy finalizing the Medicaid waiver — the agreement on how California should spend $10 billion in federal money on its state Medi-Cal program.
The new way Medi-Cal will run represents a bridge to the full implementation of federal health care reform policies that have to be in place by 2014.
The current negotiation is set to finish at the end of this month.
California Veterans Granted Access to Health Records
Government officials at last week’s Health 2.0 conference in San Francisco were exuberant when unveiling their plan to release millions of individual electronic medical records to veterans.
They call it the “Blue Button,” and the idea is, by pressing a single button on the Internet, veterans can download their own health information and store it on a thumb drive, so that any health care provider can access a complete health record instantly.
“The U.S. government is sitting on tens of billions of dollars worth of data — it is a tsunami of information,” said Todd Park, chief technology officer at HHS. “The idea is to unleash that data, for free.”
Dealing with Continual, Constant Cuts
“Well, I have to tell you, I’m looking forward to getting paid again.”
That’s the summary reaction to passage of the state budget from Dave Jones, CEO of Mountain Valleys Health Centers up north in rural Lassen County.
“We are all relieved to have a budget,” he said.
Legislature Approves Waiver Bills for Medi-Cal
Flying under the budget radar this week were two bills that frame a major restructuring of the Medi-Cal system in California.
The two bills represent about $10 billion in federal dollars coming to California. The waiver is actually negotiated between state and federal officials, and that negotiation is ongoing and due to be wrapped up by the end of this month.
But an official stamp of approval from the Legislature is an important step to eliminate confusion and ambiguity over the new ways Medi-Cal will run, and to limit lawsuits over wording in those new Medi-Cal rules.
Medi-Cal Reimbursement Tops Policy List
The California Medical Association gathered in Sacramento last weekend, and the new CMA president came up with his own variation on the real estate agent motto:
It’s about funding, funding, funding.
“We would like to see physicians be able to maintain a viable practice, first and foremost,” new CMA president James Hinsdale said. “Physicians are being squeezed by Medicare, and squeezed by Medicaid [and by California’s Medicaid program, Medi-Cal].”
At a recent panel discussion in Sacramento, the information came fast and furious — all of it on health information technology.
There was a lot to talk about. The state’s Regional Expansion Centers, the California Telehealth Network, Cal eConnect and the Beacon community in San Diego are all examples of major projects to bring electronic medical record systems to the computers of physicians across the state.
“The vast majority of the country does not have the management and financial infrastructure to implement electronic medical record systems,” David Lansky, the president and CEO of Pacific Business Group on Health, said. “And starting next year, the federal government is going to be spending substantial money to providers who can show they’re using electronic medical record technology.”