Latest News On Kansas

Latest KFF Health News Stories

Cómo el optimismo puede cerrar la brecha de cobertura de Medicaid

KFF Health News Original

Más de 2 millones de personas de bajos ingresos, la mitad de ellos en Florida y Texas, no tienen seguro porque están atrapados en una brecha de cobertura. Y sus estados no han expandido Medicaid.

How Optimism Can Close the Medicaid Coverage Gap

KFF Health News Original

Low-income residents in states that haven’t expanded Medicaid are in a tough spot: They don’t qualify for the subsidies that people with slightly higher incomes get to buy marketplace plans because of a glitch in the federal health law. But a court decision last year makes it easier for them to make good-faith estimates of a pay increase, and there is no financial penalty if they don’t hit that figure.

Hospital Investigated for Allegedly Denying an Emergency Abortion After Patient’s Water Broke

KFF Health News Original

Federal officials have ordered the probe after reports that a woman whose water broke at 18 weeks could not get medical care recommended by her doctors to end the pregnancy because hospital officials were concerned about Missouri’s strict abortion law.

Baby, That Bill Is High: Private Equity ‘Gambit’ Squeezes Excessive ER Charges From Routine Births

KFF Health News Original

Hospitals, boosted by private equity-backed staffing companies, have embraced a new idea: the obstetrics emergency department. Often, it is just a triage room in the labor-and-delivery area, but it bills like the main emergency department.

At This Recovery Center, Police Cope With the Mental Health Costs of the Job

KFF Health News Original

Burnout, PTSD, depression, and substance misuse are rampant among first responders, partly fueled by the anti-police sentiments after the killing of George Floyd. Combined with low morale, the poor state of officers’ mental health has pushed many out of the profession, leaving those who remain exhausted. A handful of specialized treatment facilities are trying to meet demand, but more resiliency training is needed, experts said.

Buy and Bust: Collapse of Private Equity-Backed Rural Hospitals Mired Employees in Medical Bills

KFF Health News Original

The U.S. Labor Department investigates Noble Health after former employees of its shuttered Missouri hospitals say the private equity-backed owner took money from their paychecks and then failed to fund their insurance coverage.

KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: Kansas Makes a Statement

KFF Health News Original

In the first official test vote since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, voters in Kansas’ primary said in no uncertain terms they want to keep a right to abortion in their state constitution. Meanwhile, the Senate is still working to reach a vote before summer recess on its health care-climate-tax measure, but progress is slow. Tami Luhby of CNN, Sandhya Raman of CQ Roll Call, and Rachel Cohrs of Stat join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews KHN’s Bram Sable-Smith, who wrote the latest KHN-NPR “Bill of the Month” installment about a very expensive ambulance trip.

Conservative Blocs Unleash Litigation to Curb Public Health Powers

KFF Health News Original

Spurred on by opposition to pandemic-related health mandates, a coalition of religious liberty groups, conservative think tanks, and Republican state attorneys general has filed a cascade of litigation seeking to rein in the powers of public health authorities.

Buy and Bust: When Private Equity Comes for Rural Hospitals

KFF Health News Original

Noble Health swept into two small Missouri towns promising to save their hospitals. Instead, workers and vendors say it stopped paying bills and government inspectors found it put patients at risk. Within two years — after taking millions in federal covid relief and big administrative fees — it locked the doors.

They Thought They Were Buying Obamacare Plans. What They Got Wasn’t Insurance.

KFF Health News Original

Some consumers who think they are signing up for Obamacare insurance find out later they actually purchased a membership to a health care sharing ministry. But regulators and online advertising sites don’t do much about it.

KHN’s ‘What the Health?’: Washington’s Slow Churn

KFF Health News Original

Stemming gun violence is back on the legislative agenda following three mass shootings in less than a month, but it’s hard to predict success when so many previous efforts have failed. Meanwhile, lawmakers must soon decide if they will extend current premium subsidies for those buying health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, and the Biden administration acts, belatedly, on Medicare premiums. Margot Sanger-Katz of the New York Times, Sandhya Raman of CQ Roll Call, and Rachel Cohrs of Stat News join KHN’s Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. Also this week, Rovner interviews KHN’s Michelle Andrews, who reported and wrote the latest KHN-NPR “Bill of the Month” episode about a too-common problem: denial of no-cost preventive care for a colonoscopy under the Affordable Care Act.

Montana Hires a Medicaid Director With a Managed-Care Past

KFF Health News Original

Montana, one of about a dozen states still managing its own Medicaid programs, has a new Medicaid director who championed handing the management of the program to private companies in Iowa and Kansas.

Travel Nurses See Swift Change of Fortunes as Covid Money Runs Dry

KFF Health News Original

Travel nurse contracts that were plentiful and paid the temporary nurses far more than hospital staff nurses are vanishing. Hospitals nationwide are turning their energies to recruiting full-time people.

Anti-Vaccine Ideology Gains Ground as Lawmakers Seek to Erode Rules for Kids’ Shots

KFF Health News Original

Legislators in Kansas are pushing bills to expand exemptions for school vaccines, allowing religious exemptions for all vaccine requirements in the state’s schools without families having to provide any proof of their beliefs. Similar bills are being introduced around the nation as the anti-vaccine movement gains traction among politicians.

Missouri Tried to Fix Its Doctor Shortage. Now the Fix May Need Fixing.

KFF Health News Original

Five states have created “assistant physician” licenses that allow medical school graduates to practice without completing residency training. But a federal indictment in Missouri of one assistant physician has some original supporters trying to rein in the medical specialty.

Desperate for Cash: Programs for People With Disabilities Still Not Seeing Federal Funds

KFF Health News Original

Almost a year after the American Rescue Plan Act allocated what could amount to $25 billion to home and community-based services run by Medicaid, many states have yet to access much of the money due to delays and red tape.