Latest California Healthline Stories
It May Be Time ‘To Take the Pain’ on Medicaid
New Kaiser Family Foundation data illustrate the rise in Medicaid enrollment and lawmakers’ continuing struggle to control costs. Budget battles in Washington state, not Washington, D.C., may show the future of the program: stark efforts to slow utilization.
Four Resolutions We Hope Lawmakers Will Keep This Year
The Republicans have promised a replacement for the health reform law. The Democrats had planned a payment advisory panel. Both parties want a “doc fix.” Will this be the year lawmakers stick to their promises?
New Year, New Deals? Breaking Down Health Plan, Doctor Alliances
Is California driving the next health care earthquake? A striking batch of insurers and physician groups are teaming up — and shaking up the industry — with the Golden State at the epicenter.
Five Health Care Issues To Watch in 2012
Mark your calendars: A slew of ACA-related payment reforms, health IT changes and health insurance exchange updates will debut next year — even as constitutional questions over the law come to an end. (Maybe.)
Politics Have Always Been Part of Policy — but Have We Hit a New Low?
Berwick’s out. Overruling the FDA is in. A flurry of recent headlines recall another moment when politics and health policy collided and set the nation on a new course.
What a Waste: Why We Can’t Rein In Extra Health Spending
Don Berwick took a parting shot at the waste in the U.S. health system as he stepped down at CMS, reinvigorating a question as old as Medicare: Why isn’t our system more efficient?
For Mentally Ill, Home Is Where the Health Home Pilot Is
Which grant was buried in the week’s news? Rhode Island won a big award for its health insurance exchange efforts, but a second CMS announcement — that the Ocean State was approved for a Health Home Medicaid project — could have major implications for mental health care.
Dueling Polls Offer Alternative Reform Opinions
Two polls released last week offered conflicting views of public opinion on health care reform. Coming in the same week the Supreme Court announced it would hear reform arguments, the polls also raise a couple of questions: How much influence does public opinion have on the Supreme Court? And vice versa?
Healthy San Francisco’s Lessons for National Health Reform
It has an employer mandate. It has improved access to care. It has survived a Supreme Court challenge. So, why aren’t national health policy leaders paying more attention to Healthy San Francisco?
Five Key Lines in the Circuit Court Rulings on Reform
Questions about the Affordable Care Act’s constitutionality took center stage again this week, as a fourth appeals court rendered its decision and the Supreme Court prepares to conference on whether to take the case.