Health Care Delivery

The smallest overall increase in the MMI in 15 years is masked by the fact that employees are bearing an increasingly large share of healthcare costs.

California’s approach to the healthcare marketplace, Covered California, has successfully held down premium costs because it has authority to select health insurers.

A survey conducted by MaPS/Millward Brown Analytics, on behalf of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, has identified multiple concerns of American consumers with cancer clinical trial participation, which could be responsible for the dismal 4% national enrollment rate in clinical trials.

The top stories in managed care included the Supreme Court declining to rule on the contraception case Zubik v Burwell, Oklahoma and Louisiana both move toward expanding Medicaid, and the price of the opioid overdose drug naloxone has increased 17-fold over 2 years.

California ex-military who need mental health care either do not receive treatment or receive inadequate care, study finds.

Value, cost, and the patient are taking center stage during the ISPOR 21st Annual International Meeting, which is being held May 21-25, 2016, in Washington, DC.

What we're reading, May 18, 2016: Senate and House Zika funding is mismatched while CDC shifts funding from local departments for Zika, and the uninsured rate in the United States fell to 9.1% in 2015.

Over the last year, The American Journal of Managed Care has covered many aspects of the hepatitis C issue: access to treatment, the cost of drugs, exclusivity deals, and more. Here are the most-read articles from the last year.

What we're reading, May 17, 2016: prices for opioid overdose drug are soaring; Valeant expands discounts for heart drugs; and 41% of Republicans want to replace the Affordable Care Act with a single-payer system.

Governor Mary Fallin's proposal to embrace Medicaid expansion and fund the state share with a cigarette tax comes nearly a year after HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell made an explicit appeal to work with governors in conservative states.

What we're reading, May 16, 2016: The Supreme Court has sent the Obamacare contraception case back to the lower courts; in some rural markets customers will have 1 option on the Affordable Care Act exchanges; and the first US case of locally transmitted Zika-related microcephaly has been reported.

With the Affordable Care Act expanding access to healthcare coverage, health plans have to handle consumers who are very different: some are very new to healthcare, some are more knowledgeable, some are healthy and never use care, and some are chronically ill, explained Robin Wright King, MBA, of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts.

Despite a federal law enacted to respond to rising national drug shortages, a new study finds that although the numbers of national drug shortages appearing each year has decreased, the overall number of national shortages remains high.

This week, the top managed care stories included an exclusivity deal that has patients with type 1 diabetes unhappy, a report found the healthcare system could have saved $73 billion from greater use of generics, and The American Journal of Managed Care seeks your nominations for an emerging leader award.

According to a new report released by the American Cancer Society, prevention, early detection, and interventions have worked for controlling cancer-but only for those cancer types for which these tools are available.

How doctors are using telemedicine to help relieve the desperate situation in war-torn Syria.

What we're reading, May 13, 2016: federal judge rules against Obamacare; Senate reaches deal for $1.1 billion to fight Zika; and Los Angeles is using healthcare funds to house the homeless.

The immunotherapy agent nivolumab was approved by the European Commission in combination with ipilimumab for the treatment of advanced melanoma, but rejected by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence for use in patients with advanced lung cancer.

While final decisions will come in Septembers, Aetna's early word comes in contrast with that of other large insurers heading into 2017.

CancerCare's 2016 Patient Access and Engagement Report underscores barriers for patient access to care, as well as communication gaps with care providers, both of which have a significant impact on patient outcomes.

What we're reading, May 11, 2016: Hillary Clinton is floating the idea of letting more people buy into Medicare; American public not on board with speeding up FDA drug approvals; and Walgreens expands mental health treatment and service options.

The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO)’s Value Framework evaluates the clinical benefit, toxicity, and cost of new interventions compared with the standard of care. ASCO’s CMO, Richard Schilsky, MD, FACP, FASCO, explains their plans to make the framework useful for clinical decisions at the point of care.

Peter Bach, MD, MAPP, director, Center for Health and Policy Research, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, speaks about DrugAbacus, the importance of using value frameworks, and using the European market as a model to recalibrate the healthcare system in the United States.

Measuring the quality of oncology care and associating it with reimbursement, and high drug prices remain important concerns of value-based outpatient cancer care. A healthcare economist reviews the current status and suggests a potential path forward.

The percentage of Democrats with an unfavorable opinion of the Affordable Care Act has increased, because more of them want to expand what the law does.

At the spring live meeting of the ACO & Emerging Healthcare Delivery Coalition in Scottsdale, Arizona, attendees heard presentations and participated in workshops that discussed better integration of care, improved use of technology, and the future of healthcare and the Affordable Care Act.

A new analysis of websites that provide information on pancreatic cancer, published in JAMA Surgery, has found that they overestimate the reading ability of the population and might even misguide them.

What we're reading: Arizona revives its Children's Health Insurance Program; new medical schools focus on creating a new type of physician; and Cigna believes its deal with Anthem won't close until 2017.

Six years after the adoption of the Affordable Care Act, a physicians' group says corporate interests are pushing aside the concerns of doctors and the needs of patients.

What we're reading, May 5, 2016: obtaining life-ending medications under California's new law won't be easy come June 9; Arizona is now the only state to not participate in CHIP; struggling insurers propose big premiums increases on Obamacare plans.