Browse by Tags

Exhibit Of The Month: California’s Hospital Fair Pricing Act Reduces Amount Paid By Uninsured

Editor’s note: This post is part of an ongoing “ Exhibit of the Month ” series. Readers who’d like to highlight other noteworthy exhibits from the same issue are encouraged to make their pitch in the comments section below. This month’s exhibit, published...

Published Thu, Jan 01 2015 12:00 PM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Health Reform, Nonmedical Determinants, Consumers, Policy, Insurance, Payment, Health Care Costs, Medicare, Hospitals, Disparities, Exhibit of the Month

The 125 Percent Solution: Fixing Variations In Health Care Prices

Summer vacation’s finally here. You’re strolling along the beach, not a care in the world when – ouch – you step on a piece of broken glass and need a few stitches at the local hospital. Such routine procedures are painless enough, but depending on where...

Published Tue, Aug 08 2014 9:00 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Consumers, Policy, Payment, Physicians, Health Care Costs, Medicare, Competition, Quality, Hospitals, Innovation

Recent Health Policy Briefs: Specialty Pharmaceuticals And Medicare Hospital Readmissions

The latest Health Policy Brief from Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation explains many of the current debates surrounding the use of specialty pharmaceuticals. Specialty pharmaceuticals—drugs and biologics used to treat chronic, serious...

Published Mon, Nov 11 2013 11:28 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Health Reform, Consumers, Policy, Payment, Chronic Care, Health Care Costs, Medicare, Access, Pharma, Hospitals, Cost, Comparative Effectiveness

No Method To The Madness: The Divergence Between Hospital Billed Charges And Payments, And What To Do About It

Note: Jen Joynt coauthored this post with Maribeth Shannon. "As we went through the years, we had these cockamamie formulas." William McGowan, CFO of the UC Davis Health System, as quoted in The Wall Street Journal , December 27, 2004 The May...

Published Mon, Oct 10 2013 11:49 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Consumers, Policy, Insurance, Payment, States, Medicare, Hospitals

Reducing Hospital Readmissions: It’s About Improving Patient Care

The issue of unnecessary hospital readmissions is now front and center in the national conversation about the quality of health care. Thanks to Medicare’s readmissions reduction program , hospitals are working hard to bring their readmission rates down...

Published Fri, Aug 08 2013 6:08 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Health Reform, Consumers, Policy, Payment, Medicare, Quality, Hospitals, Disparities, Innovation

Doctors Should Be Rewarded For Quality Care — Not For Cutting Corners

The current Medicare fee-for-service system has been criticized for rewarding practitioners in the health system for doing more -- more tests, more procedures, more expensive care -- that may not be beneficial. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) sets up new...

Published Fri, Jul 07 2013 8:33 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Health Reform, Consumers, Policy, Payment, Physicians, Health Care Costs, Medicare, Hospitals, Health Law, Technology, Effectiveness

Hospital Charges And The Need For A Maximum Price Obligation Rule For Emergency Department & Out-Of-Network Care

The release of average charges for common procedures in more than 3,000 U. S. hospitals last week by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) elicited divergent reactions – not surprisingly. On one hand, it was front-page news for most of...

Published Thu, May 05 2013 12:12 PM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Consumers, Policy, Insurance, Payment, Health Care Costs, States, Spending, Medicare, Competition, Hospitals

The Affordable Care Act At Three: Paying For Quality Saves Health Care Dollars

For decades before the passage of the Affordable Care Act, health care costs outstripped inflation, without corresponding improvements in health care quality. Our system didn’t incentivize quality or efficiency. We paid providers for the quantity of care...

Published Wed, Mar 03 2013 6:17 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Health Reform, Consumers, Prevention, Policy, Payment, Health Care Costs, Spending, Medicare, Quality, Hospitals, Medicaid

Winners And Losers From The Zaltrap Price Discount: Unintended Consequences?

Soon after Sanofi Pharmaceuticals’ Inc. August 2012 launch of the biologic drug ziv-aflibercept (brand name Zaltrap) into the U.S. market, its price triggered an unusual act of defiance on the part of oncolAogists. Physicians from Memorial Sloan-Kettering...

Published Wed, Feb 02 2013 10:46 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Consumers, Policy, Insurance, Payment, Physicians, Health Care Costs, Medicare, Pharma, Hospitals, Medicaid

Will The Readmission Rate Penalties Drive Hospital Behavior Changes?

Since the development of the metric in 1984 by Anderson and Steinberg , inpatient hospital readmission rates have been used as a marker for hospital quality. A good deal of attention is now being paid to the new readmission rate penalties in the Affordable...

Published Thu, Feb 02 2013 9:41 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Consumers, Policy, Payment, Health Care Costs, Spending, Medicare, Quality, Hospitals, Disparities

P4P Concerns, Medicare Vs. Private Insurance Lead HA Blog’s 2012 Most-Read List

Will pay for performance in health care backfire? That was the question addressed through the lens of behavioral economics by Steffie Woolhandler, Dan Ariely, and David Himmelstein in the most-read Health Affairs Blog post for 2012 . Next on the most...

Published Thu, Jan 01 2013 11:13 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Health Reform, Blog, Consumers, Policy, Politics, Insurance, Payment, Primary Care, Health Care Costs, Spending, Medicare, Hospitals, Health Law, Comparative Effectiveness

Health Policy Brief: Improving Care Transitions

The latest Health Policy Brief from Health Affairs and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation looks at efforts to improve care transitions. These are the movements that patients make among health care providers and settings as their needs change during the...

Published Fri, Sep 09 2012 8:58 AM by Health Affairs Blog

Filed under: All Categories, Consumers, Policy, Payment, Physicians, Medicare, Quality, Hospitals, Patient Safety

Syndication

Recent Posts

Tags

Archives