Is There Value in Hospital-Physician Integration?
September 6th 2013Hospitals and healthcare systems nationwide are increasingly buying more physician practices as health reform requires care delivery to move toward a more quality-based care model instead of a fee-for-service one. The reactions are mixed.
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Delaware Officials Still Don't Know Premium Costs for New Health Insurance Exchange
September 6th 2013Officials overseeing Delaware's implementation of the federal health care reform law still don't know what residents will pay for health care coverage under a new state health insurance exchange.
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Washington State Call Center Logs 900 Calls On 1st Day
September 6th 2013The phones are already busy at the Washington State Exchange call center where customer service representatives are fielding hundreds of questions about the state's new health insurance exchange, slated to open for enrollment Oct. 1.
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Clout, Not Costs, Drives Higher Charges from Hospitals, Study Says
September 5th 2013Bargaining leverage, not the cost of providing complex care, is the main reason why some hospitals can demand prices twice as high as their competitors' and still get contracts to treat privately insured patients, according to a new study.
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Costs of Health Care-Associated Infections: 9.8 Billion Annually in US
September 4th 2013A study estimates that total annual costs for five major health care-associated infections (HAIs) were $9.8 billion, with surgical site infections contributing the most to overall costs, according to a report.
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Study Shows PCMH Philosophy Boosts Patient, Physician Satisfaction
September 4th 2013A new joint program between the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and the University of Southern California (USC), demonstrates a way to mend the system with a new patient-centered program that is getting raves from patients, as well as the residents and nurses who provide their care.
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Medicare Ruling Would Hurt Alzheimer's Patients
August 30th 2013The U.S. health care bureaucracy is expanding; both dramatically (e.g. the implementation of the Affordable Care Act) and gradually. A recent decision proposed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) exemplifies the dangers to medical innovation and patients represented by the gradual expansion of the health care bureaucracy.
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Insurers Curbing Costs as Healthcare Costs Rise
August 29th 2013As healthcare costs rise in Florida, insurers and hospitals vested in the success of the Affordable Care Act, are coming up with new ways to cut costs from buying services in bulk and piloting programs to lowering hospital readmission rates and limiting the number of doctors within a plan's network.
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