A monthly round-up of KHN's original coverage on Medicaid and the uninsured.
Not rendering correctly? View this email as a web page here.
Not a subscriber? Sign up | | | Medicaid And The Uninsured | | Thursday, February 27, 2020 Visit Kaiser Health News for the latest headlines | This email contains the latest from Kaiser Health News about Medicaid and the uninsured. To view all KHN resources on these topics, visit the Medicaid or Uninsured news pages.
Needy Patients 'Caught In The Middle'
As Insurance Titan Drops Doctors
 By Phil Galewitz
For five years, Rasha Salama has taken her two children to Dr. Inas Wassef, a pediatrician a few blocks from her home in this blue-collar town across the bay from New York City.
Salama likes the doctor because Wassef speaks her native language — Arabic — and has office hours at convenient times for children.
"She knows my kids, answers the phone, is open on Saturdays and is everything for me," she said.
But UnitedHealthcare is dropping Wassef — and hundreds of other doctors in its central and northern New Jersey Medicaid physician network. The move is forcing thousands of low-income patients such as Salama to forsake longtime physicians. Across the nation, business and contractual disputes are separating patients from longtime doctors. This often occurs when doctors don't want to accept the rates insurers are willing to pay. It sometimes occurs when insurers' business plans require having a narrower network of doctors — doctors whose practice patterns may be easier to control. Read more here. ••• Medicaid Trump's Medicaid Chief Labels Medicaid 'Mediocre.' Is It?
By Phil Galewitz
This claim 'wouldn't pass muster' in a first-year statistics class. No Quick Fix: Missouri Finds Managing Pain Without Opioids Isn't Fast Or Easy
By Lauren Weber
In the first nine months of an alternative pain management program in Missouri, only a small fraction of the state's Medicaid recipients have accessed the chiropractic care, acupuncture, physical therapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy meant to combat the overprescription of opioids. ••• Surge In Enrollment As Californians Avoid Penalty, Receive State Aid
By Rachel Bluth and Samantha Young
Although a new state tax penalty and state financial aid motivated people to sign up for health insurance this year, Covered California is reopening enrollment for those who said they weren't aware of them. It's Not Just Hospitals That Sue Patients Who Can't Pay
By Blake Farmer, Nashville Public Radio
Until very recently, the separate company that runs the emergency department at Nashville General Hospital in Tennessee was continuing to haul patients who couldn't pay medical bills into court. ••• 'What The Health?' KHN's 'What The Health?': The Labor Pains Of 'Medicare For All'
Organized labor is divided over whether to support "Medicare for All." Meanwhile, many of the Democratic presidential candidates seem unable to use the health issue to their advantage. Rebecca Adams of CQ Roll Call, Jennifer Haberkorn of the Los Angeles Times and Alice Miranda Ollstein of Politico join KHN's Julie Rovner to discuss this and more. Also, for extra credit, the panelists offer their favorite health policy stories of the week they think you should read, too. KHN's 'What The Health?': Live from D.C. With Rep. Donna Shalala
President Donald Trump's proposed budget includes billions of dollars in health spending cuts, Congress gets back to work on surprise medical bills, and health care remains a top issue for the 2020 Democratic presidential candidates. Rep. Donna Shalala (D-Fla.), a former Health and Human Services secretary, joins the panel at a special taping before a live audience in Washington, D.C. Paige Winfield Cunningham of The Washington Post, Rebecca Adams of CQ Roll Call and Joanne Kenen of Politico join KHN's Julie Rovner to discuss these issues and more. | | | | | |
No comments:
Post a Comment