Latest KFF Health News Stories
Memphis Hospital Teams Up With Churches To Deliver Care
The Methodist Le Bonheur system and about 400 churches work together to make sure church members have social support when they go into the hospital and when they come out.
Vermont Edges Toward Single Payer Health Care
The new system will move many state residents into a publicly financed insurance program and pay hospitals and doctors a set fee to care for patients.
Costs Of Employer Insurance Plans Surge in 2011
An annual survey has found that the average cost of a family health insurance plan rose 9 percent this year – triple the growth rate seen in 2010. KHN’s Julie Appleby filed this story.
Some Doctors Refuse To Treat Kids Who Have Not Been Immunized
These pediatricians say they are worried about other patients in the waiting room, some of them too young to be immunized or with health problems that compromise their immune systems.
Demise Of Pa. Plan For Low-Income Adults Leaves Many Uninsured
Six months after the state ended the adultBasic health coverage, only about 40 percent of the enrollees went to Medicaid or a limited benefit plan opened to them.
Parents Fear Health Law Could Derail Autism Coverage
As federal officials draw up their list of requirements for essential health benefits under the overhaul, it’s not clear whether they will include treatment mandates passed by many states.
Religious Freedom, Individual Mandate And Anti-Injunction Act At Issue In D.C. Circuit
KHN’s Mary Agnes Carey and ABC News’ Ariane de Vogue discuss today’s oral arguments in the American Center for Law and Justice challenge to the health law.
Employers Increasingly Trimming Or Cutting Disability Benefits
The same pattern that has emerged in health insurance — employers’ shifting more costs onto workers’ shoulders — is occurring in disability coverage.
The Essential Benefit Package Americans Need
The real impact of reform will ultimately be measured by the health of the nation — and by that measure, few decisions are more important than what is included in the essential benefit package. How this package takes shape will determine whether health reform delivers on its promise.
Clinical Nuance Essential To Essential Benefits Package
Current “one-size-fits-all” health plans, in which beneficiaries face the same out-of-pocket payment for every doctor visit, test and prescription drug, should be be replaced by plans based on the health benefit gained in the particular clinical circumstance. By using this nuance, health plans can offer more comprehensive and effective coverage while addressing the affordability of health insurance.
Defining ‘Typical’: A Critical Step In Determining The Health Law’s Essential Benefits Package
As implementation of the 2010 health law unfolds, one of the most important questions surrounds how he essential benefits package will be determined. The answer will have a significant impact on the cost of coverage, both inside and outside the law’s insurance exchanges.
Analysis: Handicapping Health Care Lawsuits, And The Truth-In-Labeling Factor
Stuart Taylor puts the chances at about 25 percent to 33 percent that the health law’s individual mandate will be overturned, and adds that the court seems even less likely to sweep away the rest of the 975-page law.
Transcript: GOP Candidates Squabble Over Health Care During Tampa Debate
Monday night’s CNN/Tea Party Express debate among the Republican presidential candidates included discussion of Medicare, the health law, costs, the individual mandate and vaccines.
Health Insurers Deny Coverage To Many Who Apply For Individual Policies
Data from a federal website show that denial rates routinely exceed 20 percent and often are much higher.
Sweating The Details: Health Reform Supporters Fret Over HHS Rules
Some consumer and patient advocates worry that the administration is bending too much toward insurers and employers when it issues new health regulations.
Back-Up Plans For The Individual Mandate?
With this key health law provision’s constitutionality in question, Kaiser Health News asked six experts what alternative policy approaches might be used in its place.
Massachusetts Unions Shape Compromise For State’s Municipal Health Insurance Law
A coaltion of Massachusetts public employee unions recognized that municipal health care costs were a problem and engaged with other stakeholders in the effort to develop a solution. In the end, nobody got they wanted and that’s what a genuine compromise looks like.
These local jurisdictions, in the face of serious budget constraints, have repeatedly pushed for legal relief that would enable them to decrease the burden of public employees’ and retirees’ health benefit costs. Meanwhile, public employee unions have battled to protect what they believe their members have earned through their collective bargaining rights. In this state-policy drama, key players managed to come to a compromise that neither side loves, but both view as a solution.
Reasonable Reform Trumps In Massachusetts
Earlier this summer, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick signed a new law reforming the way that cities and towns design health insurance plans for their employees. As local governments across the country continue to confront the harsh political and fiscal issues of spiraling employee and retiree health costs, the story of how this law came to be is worth examining.
