Latest California Healthline Stories
Filling Out the Powerful Exchange Board
The board of the Health Benefit Exchange is going to be small and mighty.
It will be responsible for implementing the first, and probably largest, health insurance exchange in the nation. This exchange will concentrate the health insurance buying power of millions of Californians, and will be the central force in implementing national health care reform in California.
It will be run by five people. Three of the board’s members are in place. Former Governor Schwarzenegger named two of them: his chief of staff Susan Kennedy, and the former Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kim Belshé. The third member, by statute, is the current head of CHHS, Diana Dooley, appointed CHHS secretary two months ago by Governor Brown.
When Health Repeal Was ‘Catastrophic’
Talk of rolling back the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is dominating the news, but this isn’t the first time that Congress has weighed suddenly overturning a major health law. Does the battle over the 1988 Medicare Catastrophic Coverage Act — and its repeal 17 months later — hold any lessons for today?
How California Progress Fits With Federal Report
A new federal report on lowering health insurance costs has a distinctive California flavor to it.
One of the main points of the report from the Health and Human Services agency is to quantify the savings to families and individuals who participate in a health benefits exchange. Since California is the first in the nation to establish a post-health-reform exchange, this state is a bit of a poster child for how the health reform law will work.
Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones joined national health secretary Kathleen Sebelius in a conference call on Friday to discuss the new federal report.
How Might Physician Comparisons Change Landscape?
Health care consumers have a new tool launched in January by the federal government — a website allowing head-to-head comparisons of physicians. We asked experts how comparison tools like this might change the way health care is delivered.
And the State of Our Health Reform Is …
Did the State of the Union hold any surprises for health reform? The health care law was more than a bit player in President Obama’s address, but what unfolded on Tuesday night’s national stage paled next to what’s transpiring in Congress this week.
Small Businesses Eligible for Health Insurance Incentive
Only 43% of small business owners are familiar with a tax credit that could help pay their health insurance costs for employees, according to a national survey released last week by the Small Business Majority (SBM).
“I’m not surprised,” John Arensmeyer of the California chapter of the SBM said. “There has been a lot more heat than light shared on this law, so there’s been a lot of confusion.”
Arensmeyer has worked on a statewide “listening tour” for the past nine months, talking to small business owners about the creation of California’s health benefit exchange and the potential savings from the tax credit.
Hope Raised by Patient-Centered Medical Home
Robert Reid thinks he has seen the future, and it comes from Washington.
Not D.C. — the state of Washington.
That’s where Reid of Seattle’s Group Health Research Institute has seen the patient-centered medical home in action, and that’s what he was preaching to medical leaders in Sacramento yesterday.
Who Wins if Republicans Repeal Health Reform Law?
The debate over the nation’s health care overhaul has reached its highest pitch in months, but most industry stakeholders are sitting out of Republicans’ fight to repeal the law. The industry’s silence illustrates an emerging consensus: with the exception of a few groups, even former opponents of the overhaul now want the law to stay.
Third Time’s the Charm for Single Payer?
The megaphones and what-do-we-want cheers were in full force earlier this week on the steps of the Capitol building. It was all to support passage of a single-payer system in California, which twice already has been passed by the Legislature and vetoed by the governor.
Amanda Foran, an occupational therapist at the California Hospital Medical Center in Los Angeles who attended the rally, said national reform will help ease some of the problems of health care, but doesn’t get to the root of what she sees every day at work.
“As a clinician, I see patients come into the ER all the time because that’s the only way they can see a doctor. And of course, it’s the most expensive.”
New Year, but Same Old Budget Challenges
From coast to coast, governors and state legislators are assuming or returning to office with a common cry: We need to cut Medicaid. Are there new solutions to this old problem?