Month: September 2023
Much of the growth experienced by Medicare Advantage over the last two decades can be attributed to beneficiaries switching from traditional Medicare to MA, a trend that’s accelerated in recent years, according to a study published today in Health Affairs. “We found that switching from fee-for-service Medicare into MA, particularly by younger and healthier beneficiaries, has driven the increased ...
Laughter has been called “the best medicine” for many decades — and now there’s scientific proof. A study from the Hospital de Clínicas de Porto Alegre in Brazil has shown that regular chuckling expands heart tissue and promotes the flow of oxygen in the body, thus reducing the risk of cardiac disease. “Laughter therapy” was also ...
Hospitals are on board with the Biden administration’s increased scrutiny of “inadequate” short-term health plans, and are hoping that the federal government will go further in its crackdown on payers’ “convoluted policies.” In early July, the White House said it was working to reverse a controversial Trump-era rule that expanded the duration of the controversial ...
This is a relatively significant drop from the 2023 affordability percentage, which is 9.12%. The ACA affordability ratio applies to Applicable Large Employers (ALEs), which are subject to the ACA’s employer mandate. ALEs must use the ratio to determine affordability of the health plans offered to eligible full-time employees, in accordance with ACA law.
The Biden administration’s Department of Health and Human Services is recommending that the Drug Enforcement Administration significantly loosen federal restrictions on marijuana but stopped short of advising that it should be entirely removed from the Controlled Substances Act.
California pharmacies, including those owned by big chains, make an estimated 5 million errors a year — but they’re not required to report them to state regulators.
The Biden administration and federal regulators may be taking a victory lap following the unveiling of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS’) price negotiations list, but major players in the pharmaceutical industry feel the White House overstepped and think innovation will be stifled, ultimately leading to the creation of fewer life-changing drugs. Tuesday, CMS ...
White House domestic policy adviser Neera Tanden said Sunday that she’s convinced that the Inflation Reduction Act’s Medicare drug price negotiation program will be upheld in court. Speaking on “The Katie Phang Show” on MSNBC, Tanden said, “There is nothing in the Constitution that stops Medicare from negotiating drug prices. We really, we feel very ...
Humana has filed suit against the feds, saying the Biden administration’s bid to claw back overpayments in Medicare Advantage (MA) is built on “shifting justifications and erroneous legal reasoning.” Earlier this year, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) finalized a hotly anticipated rule that would overhaul risk adjustment data validation (RADV) audits, which determine whether ...
Two teams of US scientists have completed lab experiments testing the antibodies from vaccinated and infected Americans to see how well they might be able to fend off currently circulating variants of the virus that causes Covid-19, including the highly mutated BA.2.86. Their results match up almost exactly, and the news – at least when ...