It is officially the start of summer and our Potpourri is hot, hot, hot, but not steamy! This week we cover why health care IT doesn’t seem to create productivity gains, the use of whole-genome sequencing, the consequences on failure to comply with prescribed drug regimens and the rates of drug misuse and the potential savings for patients in CDHP plans.
The American Medical Association regularly assesses the administrative performance of the large health plans on issues relevant to physicians. This year’s report finds significant improvement in claims payment procedures and results.
When the Congressional Budget Office and the Board of Trustees of the Medicare trust funds make projections about future Medicare expenditures and revenues, they are required to utilize current law, even when everyone knows it doesn’t reflect likely reality. A memo from the Office of the Actuary presents an alternative, probably more accurate, set of Medicare projections.
Our next report related to consumer-directed, high deductible health insurance plans comes from the Employee Benefit Research Institute and describes the characteristics of people in these plans over the years 2005-2011.
This week we will discuss several high deductible insurance plan reports. The first is from America’s Health Insurance Plans and gives information on details of enrolllment and plan types.
Our Potpourri resumes, with information on consumer trust of insurers and providers, consumer use of online health information, price transparency in health care, imaging rates in integrated health care systems and effectiveness of telephonic depression therapy.
The latest projection on national health spending from the CMS Office of the Actuary is out and published in Health Affairs. It suggests that the very modest reduction in growth rate in the last couple of years is going to end and growth in spending will re-accelerate in the coming years.
Germany has encouraged wellness programs in a manner similar to the US. A new report from the Commonwealth Fund discusses results from the country’s efforts and draws lessons that may be applicable to the United States.
The latest annual report on e-prescribing from SureScripts reveals continued rapid growth. The report also details benefits which appear to flow from greater use of electronic prescribing and opportunities to use the network created by SureScripts to address information sharing in other health care sectors.
PWC’s Health Research Institute is projecting that overall medical cost trend for employment-based health care coverage will be around 7.5% for 2013, which is identical to the number it currently estimates for 2012 and close to the 2011 and 2010 actuals.
The Healthy Skeptic is a website about the health care system, and is written by Kevin Roche, who has many years of experience working in the health industry. Mr. Roche is available to assist health care companies through consulting arrangements through Roche Consulting, LLC and may be reached at [email protected].
© 2024 Healthy Skeptic.
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