April 2016 - The Health Care Blog

Replacing Meaningful Use, Advancing Care Information

By ANDY SLAVITT and KAREN DE SALVO, MD Seven years ago, Congress passed a law to spur the country to digitize the health care experience for Americans and connect doctors’ practices and hospitals, thereby modernizing patient care through the Electronic...

Published Wed, Apr 27 2016 1:49 PM by THCB

Filed under: Uncategorized

2016 Healthcare Town Hall

BY THE EDITORS THCB is pleased to introduce the 2016 Healthcare Town Hall, a special online feature brought to you in partnership with Health Catalyst. This is an experiment. The idea is to open up an ongoing dialogue around the issues that are transforming...

Published Wed, Apr 27 2016 10:44 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Uncategorized

The ACO Delusion

By ANISH KOKA, MD Accountable care organizations (ACO’s) promise to save us. Dreamed up by Dartmouth’s Eliot Fisher in 2006, and signed into law as a part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) in 2010, we have been sold...

Published Mon, Apr 25 2016 10:04 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Uncategorized, ACO, Anish Koka

A Spoonful of Inequality Helps the Medicine go Down

By SAURABH JHA, MD The conventional wisdom in the circles I hang out in – pro-Hillary, morally conscious,happy bunnies who pretend to enjoy French wine and opera – is that the greatest scourgeon humanity after the bubonic plague is inequality of...

Published Sun, Apr 24 2016 10:32 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Saurabh Jha, Featured

Confessions of a Health Plan CEO

By JIM PURCELL The fact that I was once the CEO of a health insurer may cause you to read this with some skepticism. I invite and challenge your skepticism. And I will do my very best to keep this piece strictly factual and not stray into the ambiguities...

Published Sat, Apr 23 2016 9:14 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Health Plans, Health insurance, Featured, Jim Purcell, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Rhode Island

On THCB

The Mess That is MACRA by Kip Sullivan Is Pornography Creating a Public Health Crisis? by Steve Findlay Why I Left My Pharma-Sponsored Academic Research Gig by Brad Flansbaum The Joint Commission Pain Standards: Five Misconceptions by David W Baker, MD...

Published Sat, Apr 23 2016 9:10 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Featured

Your Drugs Are About to Get More Expensive

By DEVON M HERRICK The Washington Post recently ran an article by Marlene Cimons, a Medicare Part D drug plan enrollee. Her late father had been a pharmacist and he had owned a drugstore while she was growing up. She thought it would be nostalgic to patronize...

Published Sat, Apr 23 2016 8:10 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Devon Herrick, Featured

The Mess That is MACRA

By KIP SULLIVAN MACRA (the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act) is a mess. It is extremely difficult to comprehend, it is based on assumptions that defy commonsense and research, and it may raise costs. The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission...

Published Thu, Apr 21 2016 11:58 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Tech, Kip Sullivan, Featured

Is Pornography Creating a Public Health Crisis?

By STEVEN FINDLAY Well, it’s not Zika and it won’t kill you, but pornography is being discussed—seriously—as a public health problem, even a “crisis.” The path to this claim is a long one, with a slow burn over many years. It was kicked into higher gear...

Published Thu, Apr 21 2016 10:25 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Op-Ed, Tech, Steve Findlay, Featured

Making Medicine Great Again

By MICHAEL MILLENSON The annual Lown Institute Conference advocates for the “right” kind of patient care, as in “the correct course of action.” But the political meanings of “right” and “left” also echo, sounding like a healthcare version of the recover...

Published Thu, Apr 21 2016 5:42 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Michael Millenson, Featured

Don Quixote and the Health Professional’s Endless Quest

By RICHARD GUNDERMAN, MD April 22 marks the 400th anniversary of the death of the greatest novelist who ever lived, Miguel de Cervantes. Though the day will pace unnoticed by most physicians, it is in fact one many should note. Why? Because both his life...

Published Wed, Apr 20 2016 11:57 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, Physicians, Richard Gunderman, Featured

Preparing Your Organization for MACRA 1.0

By BOBBI BROWN What does the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA), signed into law in 2015, mean for healthcare organizations and providers? At HIMSS 2016, the CMS Center for Clinical Standards and Quality Director, Kate Goodrich, MD,...

Published Wed, Apr 20 2016 9:41 AM by THCB

Filed under: THCB, CMS, ACOs, MACRA, Featured, HealthCatalyst, Bobbi Brown, SGR, Kate Goodrich, MIPS