Health Care Delivery

During a 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference session, members of The Commonwealth Fund Task Force on Payment and Delivery System Reform discussed policy recommendations aimed at preparing the United States for future pandemics and addressing care inequities brought to light by the coronavirus disease 2019 crisis.

Sachin Jain, MD, MBA, FACP, president and CEO at SCAN Group and SCAN Health Plan, discusses how data can help ensure that vulnerable populations aren't harmed by value-based payment models.

In a panel at the 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference, representatives from 3 community health plans across the United States discussed how payers are driving telehealth access and utilization in the wake of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.

Living far from a hospital did not increase risk of in-hospital mortality, according to a recent study among veteran populations with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

Compared with being offered standard testing services, offers of initial and repeat self-testing led to a 3.5-fold greater uptake of testing for HIV among transgender individuals in a new study out of England and Wales.

On this episode of Managed Care Cast, we highlight a new feature on AJMC.com, the website of The American Journal of Managed Care®, called Clinical Spotlight, where our editors provide a series of interviews with leading experts in certain specialties.

Novartis' drug, which combines sacubitril and valsartan, is the first to directly treat patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction.

Former HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Sachin Jain, MD, MBA, CEO of SCAN Group and Health Plan, took time to reflect on the advent of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and examine the Biden administration’s opportunity to enact influential health policy on the first day of the 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference.

Kicking off the 2021 AcademyHealth National Health Policy Conference, Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, stressed the important role that accurate data play in the effort to prioritize health equity during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.

Patients with ovarian cancer who lived within 10 miles of Kansas’s only National Cancer Institute–designated cancer center, and those of a non-White race, were shown to have less of a survival advantage.

The FDA approved a prescription tongue muscle stimulation device that claims to reduce mild sleep apnea and snoring in patients with obstructive sleep apnea.

Experts outlined the impact value-based insurance design (VBID) has had on the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic response and future potential applications of the model.

A new study assessed the genomic alterations identified by ctDNA analysis compared with tissue-based comprehensive genomic profiling in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.

Breast cancer oncologists explore more recent advances using oral chemotherapies to treat metastatic breast cancer.

Patients’ socioeconomic status is a significant factor in predicting survival rates for multiple myeloma, according to a new study.

A new study published in JAMA Psychiatry found emergency department (ED) visit rates for mental health conditions, suicide attempts, drug and opioid overdoses, intimate partner violence, and child abuse and neglect all increased between mid-March through October 2020, compared with the same time period in 2019.

A new study of dupilumab indicates that the drug is a safe and effective treatment for atopic dermatitis (AD) in elderly patients, with efficacy comparable to that seen in younger patients.

With New York being at the crossroads of the HIV epidemic and the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, a group of researchers wanted to know what, if any, correlation there was between the 2 disease states.

An investigation of economic data from 3123 US counties, from 2007 to 2016, indicates that the cardiovascular mortality drop the authors saw may be a result of improved economic conditions.

Individuals with serious mental illness have a greater risk of acquiring HIV compared with the general population and could therefore benefit from preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP) services in the community.

Robin Gelburd, JD, president of FAIR Health, discusses the massive jump in telehealth claims from November 2019 to November 2020.

A 9% year-over-year increase was observed in the number of US Medicare beneficiaries who enrolled in a Medicare Advantage health plan in 2020, with the increase in enrollment influenced by the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic and its related effects.

The Biden administration will reopen the health exchanges created by the Affordable Care Act (ACA); direct HHS and other agencies to reexamine other health policies, including Medicaid work requirements; and reverse the so-called global gag rule while affirming support for reproductive health.

A 13.9% increase in diagnosed cases of HIV was seen following expansion of Medicaid coverage under the Affordable Care Act.

Telemedicine sprang up very quickly and will stay around to some extent once the pandemic ends, said Peter McAllister, MD, a neurologist, board certified headache specialist, and medical director of the New England Institute for Neurology and Headache.

The American College of Rheumatology (ACR) announced a number of policy priorities that it is encouraging the new Congress and administration to focus on during the year.

On this episode, we speak with the coauthor of a paper looking at the mental health stressors facing first responders and health care workers during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. The paper found that a sizable number of these frontline workers are at risk for psychiatric illnesses at severity levels higher than other national disasters, including 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina.

Periodic review of treatment safety and monitoring are necessary as medical centers increasingly use newer disease-modifying therapies earlier in the course of multiple sclerosis.

President Joe Biden reportedly will take executive action to reopen federal marketplaces selling Affordable Care Act (ACA) health plans; Moderna investigating booster shot designed to be more effective against emerging variants of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19); Brazil coronavirus variant is found in Minnesota.

Voclosporin, the first FDA-approved oral therapy for lupus nephritis, will be sold as Lupkynis by Aurinia Pharmaceuticals and is approved for use in conjunction with immunosuppressive treatment.