Policy

The economy's lackluster recovery eroded wages and left millions chronically unemployed. It also offered significant relief from the fiscal distress of U.S. health spending. Now, spending fueled by the improving economy and the healthcare reform law's insurance and Medicaid expansions are likely to turn that around.

Increasing access to continuous labor support from a birth doula may facilitate decreases in non-indicated cesarean rates among women who desire doula care.

Sandoz, the companies generics unit, recently submitted an application with the US FDA for approval of it's biosimilar filgrastim; it's the first-ever biosimilar application with the FDA.

Karen Lewis, MS, MM, CGC, medical policy administrator and genetic counselor at Priority Health, said that providers are engaging in genetic testing, but they are doing so in "an uninformed fashion."

With the FDA accepting an application from Sandoz for it's biosimilar filgrastim, the biosimilar landscape in the US is expected to undergo a huge turnaround.

Len Nichols, PhD, director of the Center for Health Policy Research and Ethics (CHPRE) and a professor of Health Policy at George Mason University, describes how medical tourism improves care while lowering costs.

Specialty drugs expected to account for 40% of total prescription spending by 2016, according to Catamaran Corporation.

Within a week of Sandoz applying for approval of it's biosimlar to Amgen's Neupogen, U.S. senators want the FDA to lay down guidelines on naming these drugs.

Management of hepatitis C screening results can be optimized to ensure that patients receive high-quality care, reducing morbidity and costs related to the virus.

In a final rule (PDF) issued Thursday afternoon, HHS formally set an Oct. 1, 2015, compliance date for conversion to ICD-10 diagnostic and procedure codes, incorporating the absolute minimum delay imposed by Congress when it ordered HHS to roll back the conversion date previously set for Oct. 1, 2014.

HealthCare.gov, the federal health-exchange website plagued with glitches at its launch, has already cost $840 million to build, according to a Government Accountability Office (GAO) review of two task orders and one contract related to building the system.

Len Nichols, PhD, director of the Center for Health Policy Research and Ethics (CHPRE) and a professor of Health Policy at George Mason University, says that transparency in healthcare is an important concept.

Text messaging might just be the next best thing in patient engagement-at least according to the results of 1 organization's pilot program.

Uncompensated care was supposed to be a thing of the past, but it's persisting in many states not expanding Medicaid eligibility. As an alternative, for some high-cost uninsured patients, hospitals are turning to a new option.

To better align the care of beneficiaries insured under both the Medicaid and Medicare programs, CMS invited states to participate in a 3-year demonstration project. However, it seems that many beneficiaries have opted out of these care coordination programs that are offered across the country.

With diabetes costs taking double-digit increases--and expensive newer meds launching--insurers are tightening restrictions on drug use.

A recent AJMC study contained overstatements and small but importantly placed errors that have the potential to cause unwarranted on-the-ground cost problems.

Personalized medicine will be expensive in these early days of pioneering and planning. But individual genomic testing is not going to be exorbitant forever — and the ROI is gonna be big, both in patient outcomes and dollars saved.

As the healthcare industry focuses on cutting costs, narrow provider networks designed to deliver value are taking hold as a widespread business practice.

Most providers associate clinical documentation improvement (CDI) with the transition to ICD-10 coding, however, CDI - a process in which care providers receive feedback from specialists who review clinical documents - may also deliver clinical and financial benefits for healthcare organizations.

Fewer patients linger for days in hospitals without being admitted because of a new federal rule, but hospital and consumer groups are suing the government because they say the policy compromises Medicare patients' care, and patients are often stuck with costly, unexpected bills.

One insurer's experimental reimbursement model proved to lower the total costs of care for patients with 3 types of cancer. As an alternative to the traditional fee-for-service payment model, the episode payment model-which reimburses physicians on a fixed-price, based on episodes of best-practices and patient outcomes-provided encouraging findings in the battle against the rising costs of cancer care in the United States.

Vaccination prices have gone from single digits to sometimes triple digits in the last two decades, creating dilemmas for doctors and their patients as well as straining public health budgets.

Looking to control Medicaid costs, several states are launching accountable care initiatives that mirror experiments underway with Medicare and private insurers but vary significantly in their approaches.

The authors examine the association between advanced electronic health record (EHR) use and cost in hospitals. Patients treated in hospitals with advanced EHRs cost 9.66% less.

Smart watches, mHealth apps, and Bluetooth scales may just be edging into the social consciousness as a viable way to monitor personal health and manage chronic diseases, but EHR developers have been eyeing these technologies for some time, seeing them as valuable tools in the struggle to engage patients, prevent unnecessary readmissions, reduce costs, and promote long-term health.

Hospital outpatient prices for standard blood tests, cancer screening and other services varied widely and were sharply higher, on average, than prices charged by ambulatory clinics and independent doctors, an analysis of autoworker health-plan spending across 18 cities has found.

Terri Bernacchi, strategic consultant, audit and risk assessment, CIS, identified value-based contracting (VBC) as a forward-thinking approach for pricing and market needs. She discussed how VBC can improve formulary access, how it can impact the healthcare insurance exchanges, and how it can influence provider/payer reimbursement models.