Laura Joszt, MA

After weeks of negotiations and last-minute drama, the House GOP has pulled its Obamacare replacement bill after it became clear that there were not enough votes to pass it.

As part of Republicans’ fast and furious push to repeal the Affordable Care Act, there is a vote scheduled today in the House of Representatives on the American Health Care Act. However, there have been serious doubts in the days leading up to the Thursday vote that there were enough votes in the House to pass the bill.

The Republican healthcare law repeals several provisions in former President Barack Obama’s health law; however, while the GOP's American Health Care Act does provide financial assistance, similar to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Americans will find that those dollars don’t go as far as they did under the ACA.

Home visits by teams led by registered nurses or lay health workers can reduce costs and utilization of services, such as emergency department visits and hospitalizations, according to a paper published in Health Affairs.

The National Organization for Rare Disorders (NORD) has come out strongly against a bill that would provide employers with insight into workers’ personal medical and genetic information.

Difficulty in making pricing and reimbursement decisions for rare diseases has prevented patients from having universal access to new medicines despite increased investment in their research and development. In Europe, a group has proposed 9 principles to guide value assessment, pricing, and funding.

HHS Secretary Tom Price, MD, continued to downplay the Congressional Budget Office’s report on the GOP healthcare bill, promoted how the plan gives Americans more choice, and clarified an earlier statement made about the financial health of patients during a CNN town hall moderated by Wolf Blitzer and Dana Bash.

For the first time, the rate of drug price increases has surpassed the increase of the cost of hospitalizations, which is an important turning point, said Charles J. Fazio, MD, medical director of HealthPartners, Inc, during a panel discussion at America’s Health Insurance Plans’ National Health Policy Conference.

The FDA has approved Novartis’ ribociclib (Kisqali) for treatment of postmenopausal women with hormone receptor positive, human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 negative (HR+/HER2-) advanced or metastatic breast cancer.

President Donald Trump is expected to name Scott Gottlieb, MD, a resident scholar with the American Enterprise Institute, to lead the FDA, according to reports. Gottlieb would replace Robert Califf, MD, who only took over the position February 2016 and stepped down less than a year later in January 2017.

With costs of care being more closely scrutinized, there has been a proliferation of value frameworks to help guide decision making for treatments. In a blog post for Health Affairs, Robert W. Dubois, MD, PhD, and Kimberly Westrich, MA, both of the National Pharmaceutical Council, provide possible considerations for advancing the field of value frameworks.

During a speech at America’s Health Insurance Plans’ National Health Policy Conference, held March 8-9 in Washington, DC, Newt Gingrich, former House speaker, ran through the hurdles Republicans will face in order to get the American Health Care Act passed.

Protecting coverage gains that were made under the Affordable Care Act was one of the top concerns of experts representing insurers, physicians, and hospitals during a panel discussion at America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP)’s National Health Policy Conference, held March 8-9 in Washington, DC.

After weeks of leaked drafts and secret, closed door meetings, House Republicans have released the American Health Care Act, their bill to replace former President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act.

The orphan drug market continues its steady and inexorable growth even with increased scrutiny on the high prices of these lifesaving treatments.

Except in cases of critical illness, the intensive care unit may not be the best place for patients experiencing a flare-up of heart failure or their chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or even having a heart attack.

A newer version of House Republicans’ draft bill to replace the Affordable Care Act has been leaked, and it contains a few significant changes to the draft that leaked last week, including a cut-off so wealthy Americans would not be eligible for age-based tax credits.

By the time the opioid epidemic was dominating headlines, it was already out of control. So how did the epidemic sneak up on the United States, and what is being done at the state and federal levels to combat the issue?

During President Donald Trump’s first address to Congress, his call to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act was met with one of the speech's longest and loudest rounds of applause from Republicans.

A recent paper in JAMA Internal Medicine examined the accountable care organization programs in Colorado and Oregon to determine their impacts on spending, access, and utilization.

Topics like cybersecurity are always top of mind at health information technology meetings, but other topics, such as artificial intelligence, also grabbed people’s interest at HIMSS 2017.

As CMS moves forward with the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act, it is funding organizations to help solo and small practices succeed under the new payment system.

A new treatment option using stem cell transplants was shown to induce sustained remission of relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (MS). More than two-thirds of participants had no signs of progression of disability, relapse of MS symptoms, or new brain lesions after 5 years.

As Republicans debate how to move forward with repealing and replacing or reforming the Affordable Care Act, the Trump administration released a proposed rule to help stabilize the market in 2018. The rule includes a shorter open enrollment period.

AJMCtv® interviews let you catch up with experts in healthcare. Topics include challenges with immuno-oncology, including the patient voice in treatment decisions, and why payers should cover genomic testing.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has named its new president and CEO. Richard Besser, MD, who will succeed Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, MD, who ran the foundation for 14 years before announcing she was stepping down in September 2016.

An analysis of 1.7 million men and women found that low socioeconomic status is linked to a reduction in life expectancy of 2.1 years between the ages of 40 and 85.

Early in the morning on Friday, the Senate voted along party lines (52-47) to confirm US Rep. Tom Price, R-Georgia, as secretary of HHS. President Donald Trump nominated Price with the expectation that he will lead the charge to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.

Now that the Senate has confirmed US Rep. Tom Price, R-Georgia, as HHS secretary, Republicans will start to look toward making changes to the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid. Here is a look at block grants, which the GOP is considering using to reform the Medicaid program.

A judge has blocked the proposed merger of Anthem and Cigna, saying consolidation would likely result in higher prices and have other anticompetitive effects. The ruling comes just 2 weeks after another judge blocked the Aetna-Humana merger.