Latest KFF Health News Stories
A Success Story: Expanding Health Care Options For Detroit’s Poor-The KHN Interview
Dr. Herbert Smitherman talks about the Voices of Detroit Initiative that tracked 33,000 uninsured people and helped get more than half of them into coordinated care systems.
Docs: Health Law Will Make ER Crowding Worse
According to a new survey, emergency rooms doctors say crowding is caused by insured people who can’t find a doctor to treat them.
Medicare To Begin Basing Hospital Payments On Patient-Satisfaction Scores
Beginning in 2012, bad grades from unhappy patients could cause hospitals to lose out on bonuses.
Emergency Rooms Provide Care Of Last Resort For Mentally Ill
With states reducing the number of psychiatric beds, mentally ill patients often languish in hospital emergency rooms for several days, sometimes longer. At most, they get drugs but little counseling, and the environment is often harsh.
Letter To The Editor: Setting The Record Straight On RAND’s Findings
RAND Health Vice President and Director Arthur Kellermann, M.D., disputes the way his organization’s research was depicted in a recent column by John Goodman about Medicaid. Kellerman notes the study in question was designed to examine health care quality, not to determine the value of different types of insurance.
Patient Safety Expert Says Law Could Lead To Overuse Of Medical Care: The KHN Interview
Rosemary Gibson, who has led national efforts to improve health care quality and safety, is concerned about 32 million newly insured Americans being exposed to too much treatment.
Demand Grows For Palliative Care
Seriously ill patients, even when not facing death, can benefit from better pain and symptom management, care coordination and help setting goals from specially trained teams, which typically include a doctor, a nurse, a social worker and a spiritual counselor.
Who Should Get Pediatric Palliative Care?
Pediatric palliative care is for children who are living with very serious and complex illness. They do not have to have a life expectancy of only a few months.
Palliative care takes an interdisciplinary approach similar to hospice
Palliative Care Can Help Children And Families Navigate Bewildering Medical Terrain
About 1.3 million children live with serious or life-limiting illness and many need an interdisciplinary approach to care to help their families make sense of the maze of medical treatment.
Housing Bust Hurts County Health Efforts
As property tax revenues have fallen, many cities and counties have been forced to cut health services.
Doctor Shortages Under Health Law May Depend On Geography
Study suggests that areas with low rates of primary care physicians, such as the South and Mountain West, could struggle as they see a surge in Medicaid enrollments and federal incentives for doctors may not be much help.
States’ Mental Health Budgets Fall In Recession
Analysis by advocacy group NAMI finds cuts of $1.8 billion, or about 8 percent of the states’ total budgets, from 2009 through 2011.
Ariz. Medicaid Cuts Spur Debate Over Impact On Providers
Doctors and hospitals raise concerns that reducing eligibility may spur ER crowding and premium increases, but experience in Missouri shows less dire consequences.
When Care Is Split Between Medicare And Medicaid: KHN Interview With Melanie Bella
Melanie Bella heads the new federal office that seeks to help people whose coverage is often fragmented because they qualify for both programs and to save the government money by streamlining that coverage.
Blumenthal To Leave Obama’s Health IT Office
Harvard researcher paved the way for a $27 billion effort to push doctors and hospitals into the digital age.
Hospitals Try New Approaches To Curb Emergency Department Crowding
Officials are shaking up procedures with some hospitals abandoning traditional ER beds and cubicles, shifting patients more quickly to medical units and taking over underused hospital space.
Insurers Clash With Hospitals And Doctors Over ACO Rules
Powerful interests that are supposed to create and run the health law’s new accountable care organizations are fighting over what the rules governing ACOs should say.
Health Care Battles To Surge Anew In 2011: Jordan Rau
KHN reporters preview some of the big issues coming this year: KHN correspondent Jordan Rau says doctors and hospitals could come under increased scrutiny.
More Patients Making Appointments Online As Doctors Embrace Web
A web-based company called ZocDoc is piggybacking on doctors’ increasing willingness to let patients make appointments online.
