Social Security, Medicare Strained by Slow Economic Recovery, Aging Workforce

The government is allowing Medicare Advantage (MA) plans to delay returning hundreds of millions of dollars or more in government overpayments; a proposed new extension of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) might make birth control coverage more accessible for certain private insurance plans; a study found that students lost around 33% of their school year because of the pandemic’s educational barriers and are struggling to regain that lost time.

On this episode of Managed Care Cast, Ari D. Panzer, BS, lead author and researcher, then at Tufts Medical Center—now at Duke University—discusses the findings from his team’s investigation into coverage decisions by health plan insurers of the 66 drugs approved by the FDA in 2018.

Adults with diabetes who were forced to switch from an employer-sponsored health plan to a high-deductible health plan (HDHP) were 25% more likely to require an emergency department (ED) or hospital visit for hyperglycemia, but not for hypoglycemia, than those who did not switch plans.

An unprecedented level of detail and robustness around interoperability standards is on its way, and on this episode of Managed Care Cast, we speak with Donald Rucker, MD, the former National Coordinator for Health Information Technology in HHS, about what the opportunities and responsibilities for payers are.

Coverage of our peer-reviewed research and news reporting in the health care and mainstream press.

A session at the 2022 American Society of Health-System Pharmacists Midyear Clinical Meeting & Exhibition reviewed some trends in the 340B drug pricing programs and Medicaid.