This document discusses issues around rising healthcare costs in the US and Massachusetts. It outlines progress made on universal healthcare coverage through the Affordable Care Act and Massachusetts law. However, healthcare spending continues to grow much faster than economic growth. The document suggests focusing on preventing chronic diseases, which account for most healthcare spending, through workplace wellness programs and health plan designs that incentivize healthy behaviors. It proposes a state-level forum for businesses and healthcare experts to discuss driving innovation and efficiency in healthcare delivery to reduce costs.
Transparency has become even more important in the past year as we begin the health care reform discussion. There is not a signature event in Nashville to bring quality, marketing, transparency, and technology together. The Naked Hospital event will take the user experience from high level strategy through national and state legislative issues through practical hands on tools to walk away with. The event will focus on how and why health systems and hospitals should focus on quality reporting as well as financial reporting. At the end of the day, all of this puts additional strains on the information systems and resources deployed by most health systems and hospitals. How will they cope? What is the next step?
Transparency has become even more important in the past year as we begin the health care reform discussion. There is not a signature event in Nashville to bring quality, marketing, transparency, and technology together. The Naked Hospital event will take the user experience from high level strategy through national and state legislative issues through practical hands on tools to walk away with. The event will focus on how and why health systems and hospitals should focus on quality reporting as well as financial reporting. At the end of the day, all of this puts additional strains on the information systems and resources deployed by most health systems and hospitals. How will they cope? What is the next step?
Domestic Innovative Financing for Health: Learning From Country ExperienceHFG Project
Advances in health care are extending and improving the quality of life for people around the world, but such advances come with a price tag. While all nations face budgetary constraints for health funding, low- and middle-income countries have the fewest resources for their health sectors. And as many of these nations begin transitioning away from donor-funding for health programs, they need to ensure that any financing gaps are not covered by households paying out-of-pocket in a way that increases inequities in health access and pushes more people into poverty. Clearly, there is a need for low- and middle-income countries to increase the flow of equitable and sustainable domestic financing for health.
A new HFG report —Domestic Innovative Financing for Health: Learning From Country Experience—highlights “domestic innovative financing” options; that is, those originating from domestic sources which can generate additional resources for the health sector. The focus of the report is not to prioritize revenue generation, but rather to “assess country experience with domestic innovative financing options, both successes and failures, in order to increase global wisdom on selecting and implementing them in low- and middle-income countries.” It draws on lessons learned from several countries to provide evidence and scenarios for low- and middle-income nations to increase the financing potential of national health systems.
Despite occasional ‘discovery pieces’ the biomedical literature in English has been almost entirely silent on the Cuban experience and US
government policy temporarily forbade publication of articles from Cuba by US journals or their foreign subsidiaries.
The unwillingness to take account of the Cuban experience, or to even view it as an alternative route through which some societies can move toward the universal goal of health promotion, represents an important oversight. The achievements in Cuba thereby pose a challenge to the authority of the biomedical community in countries that define the scientific agenda.
Edwin Park: "Medicaid Undone? Covering the Safety Net’s New Future" 7.26.17reportingonhealth
Edwin Park's slides from the Center for Health Journalism webinar, "Medicaid Undone? Covering the Safety Net’s New Future," 7.26.17
More info: https://www.centerforhealthjournalism.org/content/medicaid-undone-covering-safety-nets-new-future
The pending Healthy Ohio 1115 Medicaid waiver would require nearly all non-disabled adults on Ohio Medicaid to pay premiums. If approved by the federal government, the waiver would result in a greater number of uninsured Ohioans as well as increased Medicaid administrative costs and complexity.
Speakers include:
* Tara Britton, Public Policy Fellow, The Center for Community Solutions
* Nita Carter, Project Director, UHCAN Ohio
Join Business Forward to welcome Arielle Kane, Director of Health Care at the Progressive Policy Institute, for a discussion on the current state of health care access in America. Kane will discuss how improvements to the ACA are more beneficial than repealing the law and moving to a single-payer system.
Domestic Innovative Financing for Health: Learning From Country ExperienceHFG Project
Advances in health care are extending and improving the quality of life for people around the world, but such advances come with a price tag. While all nations face budgetary constraints for health funding, low- and middle-income countries have the fewest resources for their health sectors. And as many of these nations begin transitioning away from donor-funding for health programs, they need to ensure that any financing gaps are not covered by households paying out-of-pocket in a way that increases inequities in health access and pushes more people into poverty. Clearly, there is a need for low- and middle-income countries to increase the flow of equitable and sustainable domestic financing for health.
A new HFG report —Domestic Innovative Financing for Health: Learning From Country Experience—highlights “domestic innovative financing” options; that is, those originating from domestic sources which can generate additional resources for the health sector. The focus of the report is not to prioritize revenue generation, but rather to “assess country experience with domestic innovative financing options, both successes and failures, in order to increase global wisdom on selecting and implementing them in low- and middle-income countries.” It draws on lessons learned from several countries to provide evidence and scenarios for low- and middle-income nations to increase the financing potential of national health systems.
Despite occasional ‘discovery pieces’ the biomedical literature in English has been almost entirely silent on the Cuban experience and US
government policy temporarily forbade publication of articles from Cuba by US journals or their foreign subsidiaries.
The unwillingness to take account of the Cuban experience, or to even view it as an alternative route through which some societies can move toward the universal goal of health promotion, represents an important oversight. The achievements in Cuba thereby pose a challenge to the authority of the biomedical community in countries that define the scientific agenda.
Edwin Park: "Medicaid Undone? Covering the Safety Net’s New Future" 7.26.17reportingonhealth
Edwin Park's slides from the Center for Health Journalism webinar, "Medicaid Undone? Covering the Safety Net’s New Future," 7.26.17
More info: https://www.centerforhealthjournalism.org/content/medicaid-undone-covering-safety-nets-new-future
The pending Healthy Ohio 1115 Medicaid waiver would require nearly all non-disabled adults on Ohio Medicaid to pay premiums. If approved by the federal government, the waiver would result in a greater number of uninsured Ohioans as well as increased Medicaid administrative costs and complexity.
Speakers include:
* Tara Britton, Public Policy Fellow, The Center for Community Solutions
* Nita Carter, Project Director, UHCAN Ohio
Join Business Forward to welcome Arielle Kane, Director of Health Care at the Progressive Policy Institute, for a discussion on the current state of health care access in America. Kane will discuss how improvements to the ACA are more beneficial than repealing the law and moving to a single-payer system.
DEVELOPMENT OF AN ADVOCACY CAMPAIGN (Part 2) 2
The Case for Frontotemporal Degeneration (FTD)
(Part 2)
NURS-6050N-23: Policy & Advocacy for Pop Health
Introduction
The present US health care policies and regulations established by the various government agencies, insurance companies and other healthcare organizations pose certain challenges to us as nurses and of course the patients who are generally the ones caught in the middle of cost and payment constraints and access to applicable quality care. According to the 2005 data from the United States Census Bureau about 50 million Americans are uninsured while at the same time the cost of health care is still rising. With the continued rising costs of care, degenerating and lack of access to comprehensive care, and poor-quality services, there is an urgent need to improve our health care performances in the United States. (Carey, 2006). As such, changes are required in government, health care organizations and insurance policies that tackles most of the health-related issues. (Kendig, 2006). This project focuses on the development of an advocacy campaign with a view towards addressing how current laws or regulations may affect how to proceed in advocating for a proposed policy and how to influence legislators and other policymakers to enact a policy. The project also examined possible barriers to the legislative steps that could impede a proposed policy from being enforced as designed. (WaldenU, 2017).
The existing laws and regulations that are used can address the situation and contribute to changing the chronic illnesses that plague the world but using these strategies by themselves will not be suffice for addressing the problems associated with Non-Communicable Diseases across the world. This is because many countries have weak health care systems, even those that are considered “First” world countries such as America. The existing laws and regulations are encapsulated in global legal doctrines as well as national doctrines to provide budgeting for healthcare prevention but this often is negatively impacted by under-budgeting that occurs, poor demand forecasting, and poor distribution of services to those most in need. (Cherry, & Trotter Betts, 2005).
Governments across the world are implementing fiscal policies that are predicated upon raising taxes, utilization of subsidiary statutory instruments such as regulations that establish standards that must be met toward cigarettes, alcohol, and other major contributors to NCDs, and the improvement of access to NCD treatments. Government agencies also play a role in monitoring and enforcing regulations that are established to address this global healthcare problem. Other measures that are taken by governments are predicated upon the allocation of resources to train healthcare providers, developing policies that ensure the retention of healthcare providers, establi.
hCentive Health Insurance Exchange PlatformAlisha North
Take advantage of hCentive's deep expertise in the healthcare insurance industry. Browse through or download our white papers to get an in-depth understanding of the industry.
Assignment 1Public Administration – The Good, th.docxtrippettjettie
Assignment 1
Public Administration – The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
hhhhhhh
Modern Public Administration
Prof. hhhhh
Date: hhhhh
The White House Issue: Health reforms
The Health Care Reforms are the best obsession for the United States, Majorly most of the American citizens who were responsible for originating the improvement found it helpful. Back in the year 2011, a countrywide crackdown was conducted as a way to oppose the frauds that were becoming a health concern, and the federal administration recovered almost $ 4.1 billion. The Health Care Improvement for capturing the healthcare frauds and scams allowed President Obama’s policy to enhance on strict penalties like compensation and fines. By providing the United States citizens with Patient Protection as well as, ACA (Affordable Care Act) was the ultimate presidential success for President Barack Obama (.whitehouse., 2014).
The public policy
As most of the leaders decided to adopt a firm stand with the many important issues within the American State, the essential point was the definition of the improvement of the Health Care in the United States by President Barack Obama and when discussing the fitness and care reform a lot of issues are put on focus.
The public policies are categorized into four groups which are the regulatory policy, the distributive policy, the redistributive policy and lastly the constituent policy. Every issue in the White House is organized it the way it is related to any of the four types of public systems (NCBI, 2016). The financial regime faces most of the significant issues, and many may need to be in a position to determine the problems which are related to funding system because some of these issues affect some of the American citizens.
Distributive policy as mentioned above, it is a policy that focuses on supporting the selected issues; the strategy that is behind the distributive health care is the local understanding and having a flexible organizational design. The idea of distribution is quite broad as it classifies distributive policy action towards including all the public processes that are responsible for developing as well as providing equitable access to the resources. In regards to the health issues, this may have financial aid for assisting the excluded to have access to the healthcare. Also, across funding aid to assist in the inside operations of the health institutions such as the combination of threats which enhances the inclusion of reasonably inadequate health services. Also, the appointment systems facilitate the secondary concern for the needy to access health services (Mackintosh, 2013). It also reduces the shifts regarding the fitness care regime in processes that will be able to satisfy and offer the proper access to those who are deprived by supporting the distributive promises that the government has made and having full access to healthcare services. In this kind of shift, the significant disadvantage is ...
SOCW 6351 Wk 9 Discussion 1. Need Responses.Respond in one of t.docxrosemariebrayshaw
SOCW 6351 Wk 9 Discussion 1. Need Responses.
Respond in one of the following ways:
· Describe two factors that might make minority groups especially vulnerable in the Medicaid policy your colleague cited. Explain why these groups may not have a voice in the policy-making process.
· Offer examples of organized self-help and citizens’ groups as both support mechanisms and potentially powerful lobbies. Describe how these lobbying bodies can help in amending the policy your colleague described.
Support your response with specific references to the resources. Be sure to provide full APA citations for your references.
NA:
Top of Form
Medicaid is a medical assistance program developed specifically for low income individuals of any age, unlike Medicare, which is designed for those over 65 and have no income requirements (“Difference between Medicare and Medicaid”, n.d.). When health care policies are change, they affect programs such as Medicaid and Medicare. For example, when the ACA (Affordable Care Act) was implemented, it led to an increase of enrollment as it made the process easier and reached more individuals and it expanded Medicaid eligibility to low-income adults (Wachino, Artiga & Rudowitz, 2014).
In the state of Pennsylvania, a Medicaid policy that I would amend would be the Healthy PA policy, which was a Medicaid expansion that included drug and alcohol services (IRETA, 2015). The issue is the length of time it takes for someone to be admitted into a program. Whether it’s getting into an inpatient or outpatient program, the process needs to be expedited and more streamlined. Many who are suffering from substance abuse disorders struggle with finally getting themselves into a program and delaying the process could result in someone hesitating and deciding not to move forward with treatment that is crucial (IRETA, 2015).
In Pennsylvania, stakeholders include a steering committee, which is made up of hospitals, health care providers, consumers, foundations and academic institutions (“HIP”, 2019). This committee comes up with ways to improve population health and control health cost including Medicaid and Medicare. They developed a plan for heathcare delivery that will improve the quality of life for everyone, without limitations on income or background (“HIP”, 2019). This committee has 5 work groups that develop implementation plans for the goals that were developed by the committee and focus on specific aspects such as payment, price and quality transparency, population health, healthcare transformation and health information technology (“HIP”, 2019).
References:
HIP stakeholders. (2019). Retrieved from https://www.health.pa.gov/topics/Health-Innovation/Pages/Stakeholders.aspx
IRETA. (2015). Pennsylvania’s Medicaid expansion smooths the road to addiction treatment, but barriers remain. Retrieved from https://ireta.org/resources/pennsylvanias-medicaid-expansion-smooths-the-road-to-addiction-treatment-but-barriers-remain/
Wachino, V., A.
Healthcare Financial Transformation: Five Leading StrategiesHealth Catalyst
Healthcare financial transformation—improving care delivery while lowering costs—has been an ongoing challenge for health systems in the era of value-based care and an even more prominent concern amid COVID-19. While better care and reduced expense to organizations and consumers might seem like opposing goals, by understanding the true cost of services and other drivers of expense, organizations can successfully manage costs while maintaining, and even improving, care delivery. To that end, health systems can use data- and analytics-driven tools and strategies to addresses financial challenges, including uncompensated care, prolonged accounts receivable days, discharged not final billed cases, inefficient resource use, and more.
Running Head MEDICARE POLICY Of 2019 MEDICARE POLIC.docxglendar3
Running Head: MEDICARE POLICY Of 2019
MEDICARE POLICY
Medicare Policy of 2019
Maria Williams
Southern New Hampshire University
06/07/2020
Introduction
Description of the Medicare Policy of 2019
Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act (PSQIA) is one of the most important health care policies in the United States. The Act was passed in 2005 to protect health care professionals and workers who report unsafe conditions in hospitals. The policy was formulated to encourage the reporting of adverse events and malpractices that occur in health care centers. Such events may include medical errors and accidents. The law seeks to protect the identity of professionals who report such incidences while maintaining the patients’ confidentiality. To protect patient privacy, the law imposes fines for confidentiality breaches (Nash, 2011). The policy also bestows the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) with the responsibility to publish a list of patient safety organizations that record and assess patient safety data. The Office of Civil Rights also enforces the policy among national health care facilities. The primary goal of this policy is to encourage health professionals to improve the safety and quality of health care and to understand the underlying causes of hazards in the delivery of healthcare (Nash, 2011). The policy also seeks to encourage the sharing of such results in all states within a protected legal framework, thereby minimizing any risks that are associated with patient care. In so doing, the policy hopes to reduce potential risks that patients are exposed to.
Rationale and Professional Relevance
Maintaining patient safety and quality of care are some of the most important goals of healthcare professionals. The policy goes a long way in encouraging all health care professionals to observe safety and quality standards. The Institute of Medicine regards patient safety as indistinguishable from delivery of quality care (Mitchell, 2008). Health professionals should observe patient safety practices such as use of stimulators, bar coding, computerized order entry, and crew resource management to avoid errors and improve health care processes (Mitchell, 2008). In order to comply with the legislation, nurses and other professionals should focus their attention on defining and measuring quality long before national and state level stress on quality improvements. Nurses have the responsibility in patient safety to avoid medication errors and prevent patient falls.
Stakeholder Analysis
The success of a policy depends on stakeholder participation and compliance. The key stakeholders of the policy can be broadly categorized as internal or external stakeholders. Within a health care institution, internal stakeholders include health professionals such as nurses, physicians, pharmacists, and clinical officers. External stakeholders, on the other hand, include patients, community members, government re.
Running Head MEDICARE POLICY Of 2019 MEDICARE POLIC.docxtodd581
Running Head: MEDICARE POLICY Of 2019
MEDICARE POLICY
Medicare Policy of 2019
Maria Williams
Southern New Hampshire University
06/07/2020
Introduction
Description of the Medicare Policy of 2019
Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act (PSQIA) is one of the most important health care policies in the United States. The Act was passed in 2005 to protect health care professionals and workers who report unsafe conditions in hospitals. The policy was formulated to encourage the reporting of adverse events and malpractices that occur in health care centers. Such events may include medical errors and accidents. The law seeks to protect the identity of professionals who report such incidences while maintaining the patients’ confidentiality. To protect patient privacy, the law imposes fines for confidentiality breaches (Nash, 2011). The policy also bestows the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) with the responsibility to publish a list of patient safety organizations that record and assess patient safety data. The Office of Civil Rights also enforces the policy among national health care facilities. The primary goal of this policy is to encourage health professionals to improve the safety and quality of health care and to understand the underlying causes of hazards in the delivery of healthcare (Nash, 2011). The policy also seeks to encourage the sharing of such results in all states within a protected legal framework, thereby minimizing any risks that are associated with patient care. In so doing, the policy hopes to reduce potential risks that patients are exposed to.
Rationale and Professional Relevance
Maintaining patient safety and quality of care are some of the most important goals of healthcare professionals. The policy goes a long way in encouraging all health care professionals to observe safety and quality standards. The Institute of Medicine regards patient safety as indistinguishable from delivery of quality care (Mitchell, 2008). Health professionals should observe patient safety practices such as use of stimulators, bar coding, computerized order entry, and crew resource management to avoid errors and improve health care processes (Mitchell, 2008). In order to comply with the legislation, nurses and other professionals should focus their attention on defining and measuring quality long before national and state level stress on quality improvements. Nurses have the responsibility in patient safety to avoid medication errors and prevent patient falls.
Stakeholder Analysis
The success of a policy depends on stakeholder participation and compliance. The key stakeholders of the policy can be broadly categorized as internal or external stakeholders. Within a health care institution, internal stakeholders include health professionals such as nurses, physicians, pharmacists, and clinical officers. External stakeholders, on the other hand, include patients, community members, government re.
Running Head MEDICARE POLICY Of 2019 MEDICARE POLIC.docx
Health Promotion Fall 2012 Summit
1. HEALTH CARE: WHOSE BUSINESS IS IT?
Philip Edmundson
Chairman & CEO, William Gallagher Associates
Co-Chair, Alliance for Business Leadership
Health Promotion Initiative
2. PROGRESS: UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE COVERAGE
Massachusetts
• The Commonwealth led the nation in providing universal
health care coverage to its citizens in 2006.
United States
• The Affordable Care Act, modeled on MA law, was passed
in 2010 and upheld by the Supreme Court in 2012. It
requires all states to establish exchanges for the purchase
of health insurance by 2013.
• The first step in health care reform has been accomplished:
universal coverage that includes everyone in the system
and overcomes the risk of adverse selection.
3. CHALLENGE: SPIRALING HEALTH CARE COSTS
United States
• National health care expenditures accounted for 18% of
GDP in 2011, and are heading for 20% by 2020 (Health
Affairs).
Massachusetts
• Health care spending has been growing in MA at least
twice as fast as the rest of the state’s economy (Kaiser
Family Foundation).
4. COST DRIVERS IN HEALTH CARE
• Hospital costs, physician costs, medical technology, plan
administration, government regulation, and waste, fraud
and abuse are leading cost drivers.
• Many of these services and products are necessary.
• What is unnecessary? The amount of money spent on
treating chronic disease.
• $3 out of every $4 spent on health care goes to treat
chronic diseases, many of which are preventable.
5. WHAT’S THE BIG IDEA?
The Alliance asked 2 renowned economists “how can
business best leverage change in health care that
promotes wellness and reduces costs?”
Jonathan Gruber, MIT – business should focus on the
demand side of the equation (workplace wellness,
health plan design)
David Cutler, Harvard – business should focus on the
supply side (help drive innovation and efficiency in
health care delivery)
• Attend Alliance Forum: convening businesses, health
care providers and academic experts to discuss how
innovation stands to impact health care costs
6. WHAT CAN GOVERNMENT DO TO PROMOTE HEALTH
AND REDUCE COSTS?
Federal Level
• Uphold the Affordable Care Act – ensure that all
Americans have health insurance coverage.
• Provide Funding for Medical Research – NIH funding
sustains innovation in medicine, creates jobs and
contributes to a better quality of life for many Americans.
• Provide Funding for Public Health – The U.S. spends
75% of health care dollars treating chronic disease and
dedicates less than 5% to preventing it. We need to
focus more on prevention.
7. WHAT CAN GOVERNMENT DO?
State Level
• Health Care Cost Containment – August 2012, MA
Legislature passed legislation to bring state health care
spending in line with gross state product.
• Workplace Wellness Tax Credits – Included in the law:
25% of cost, up to $10,000, in tax credits for workplace
wellness programs.
• Public Health Funding via a Soda Tax – Not included in
the law: provision to eliminate the tax exemption on soda
would yield $40 to $50 million in revenue.
8. WHAT CAN BUSINESS DO?
Establish Workplace Wellness Programs
• Effective 1/1/13, a new state tax credit will support
business costs up to $10,000 for these programs.
• Department of Public Health is in the process of
promulgating regulations on eligible programs. Join the
Alliance as we weigh-in.
Alter Health Plan Design
• Consider tiered health network plans or high deductible
health plans with Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) as
options that can reduce cost and educate employees to
be smarter consumers of health care.
9. QUESTIONS FOR BREAKOUT SESSION
1. Has your company established workplace wellness
programs? What are the barriers and opportunities?
2. Has your company considered alternative health plan
design options? Why or why not?
3. Would you attend an Alliance forum on innovation in
health care delivery? What other big ideas in health
care reform should the Alliance pursue?
10. CONTACT INFORMATION
Philip Edmundson, Co-Chair
The Alliance Health Promotion Initiative
pedmundson@wgains.com
Kelly Bovio, Senior Policy Advisor
The Alliance for Business Leadership
kbovio@allianceBL.org
The Alliance for Business Leadership
www.AllianceforBusinessLeadership.org