Health Care Reform

Latest California Healthline Stories

Obamacare at 13: Biden and a KHN Reporter Remember

The White House gathered the people who helped pass the Affordable Care Act 13 years ago — partly to congratulate themselves but also to emphasize that they still have much work to do to make health care affordable.

Listen to ‘Tradeoffs’: Medical Debt Delivers ‘A Shocking Amount of Misery’

Medical debt in America pushes families to the edge. Ariane Buck and his wife, Samantha, were denied care at their doctor’s office because of an unpaid bill of less than $100. A trip to the emergency room added thousands of dollars to their health care debt, which topped $50,000 by the time they filed for bankruptcy.

New CDC Opioid Guidelines: Too Little, Too Late for Chronic Pain Patients?

In November, the CDC released new guidelines for prescribing opioids for pain, allowing physicians more flexibility. But doctors, patients, and advocates wonder if the updated standards will be too little, too late to help chronic pain patients in a country still focused on fighting the ongoing opioid crisis.

¿Ayudan las nuevas guías sobre opioides a los pacientes con dolor crónico?

Las recomendaciones dejaron a muchos pacientes lidiando con las consecuencias para la salud mental y física de la reducción rápida de la dosis o la suspensión abrupta de los medicamentos que habían estado tomando durante años, lo que conlleva riesgos de abstinencia, depresión e incluso suicidio.

Watch: Dental Device at Center of Lawsuits Was Used on Patients Without FDA Review

More than 10,000 dental patients have been fitted with an Anterior Growth Guidance Appliance, or AGGA, according to court records. But the unproven and unregulated device has not been evaluated by the FDA, according to a months-long joint investigation by KHN and CBS News.

California Senate’s New Health Chair to Prioritize Mental Health and Homelessness

California state Sen. Susan Talamantes Eggman of Stockton has been appointed chair of the Senate’s influential health committee. A licensed social worker, Eggman said she will make mental health care and homelessness front-burner issues.