Medicare & Medicaid
News articles in this section include actions by federal regulators like the CMS and HHS, as well as information on Medicare and state Medicaid coverage and benefits.
In November, after a bad fall, 85-year-old Elizabeth Cannon was taken to a hospital outside Philadelphia for six and a half days of “observation,” followed by nearly five months at a nearby nursing home for rehabilitation and skilled nursing care. The cost: more than $40,000.
The region's average penalty was just over one-half of 1 percent of total Medicare reimbursements; last year it was one-third of 1 percent. Still, that's lower than the national average, says Jordan Rau, a Kaiser Health News journalist who interpreted the annual Medicare data.
Tens of thousands more immigrant children in California are receiving full Medi-Cal benefits just a few months after a state law took effect that expanded their access to the government-subsidized health program.
Even as the Affordable Care Act remains a political flash point, new research shows it is dramatically improving poor patients’ access to medical care in states that have used the law to expand their Medicaid safety net.
The federal government’s readmission penalties on hospitals will reach a new high as Medicare withholds more than half a billion dollars in payments over the next year, records released Tuesday show.
Five Southern Nevada hospitals were among six statewide that received only one star in a controversial five-star rating system unveiled Wednesday by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
The federal government released its first overall hospital quality rating on Wednesday, slapping average scores on some of California’s best-known medical centers while awarding top scores to unheralded ones.
It is no secret that the cost and quality of health care can vary greatly within a state as large as California. But by how much?
Donna Nickerson spent her last working years as the activity and social services director at a Turlock, Calif., nursing home.
Only days after Judy Hanttula came home from the hospital after surgery last November, her doctor’s office called with bad news: Records showed that instead of traditional Medicare, she had a private Medicare Advantage plan, and her doctor and hospital were not in its network.