California Watch
News stories in this section spotlight activities in California, including actions by the state Assembly and state Senate; proposed legislation; regulators like the Department of Managed Health Care and Department of Insurance; and the state ACA exchange, Covered California.
A law that allows rural hospitals to bill Medicare for rehabilitation services for seniors at higher rates than nursing homes and other facilities has led to billions of dollars in extra government spending, federal investigators say.
The federal government lost ground last year in reducing improper payments from programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and tax credits for the working poor, experiencing a nearly 18 percent increase in the costs.
The percentage of Latinos and African Americans who signed up for subsidized health coverage through California's insurance exchange increased modestly during the second annual open enrollment period, officials announced Thursday.
Starting March 27, legally married same-sex couples will be able to take unpaid time off to care for a spouse or sick family members even if they live in a state that doesn’t recognize their marriage.
Technology entrepreneur Jonathan Bush says he was recently watching a patient move from a hospital to a nursing home. The patient’s information was in an electronic medical record, or EMR. And getting that record from the hospital to the nursing home, Bush says, wasn’t exactly drag and drop.
Nearly 500,000 new consumers signed up for insurance and picked a health plan through Covered California through Feb. 22, executive director Peter Lee announced at the exchange board meeting Thursday.
Gov. Jerry Brown has appointed a Latino health activist and long-time labor leader who's worked at top levels of state government to the board at Covered California, the state health benefit exchange.
The legal campaign to destroy President Obama's health care law may be nearing its conclusion, but as the Supreme Court deliberates over the law's fate, the search for a replacement by Republican lawmakers is finally gaining momentum.
A bill in the California Legislature that would require pharmaceutical manufacturers to explain the prices for their expensive products is thought to be the first legislative attempt of its kind in the country.
California's uninsured rate fell by as much as 40% in 2014, in large part because of expanded coverage under the Affordable Care Act, according to a fact sheet by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, Payers & Providers reports.