A new report from Thomson Reuters examines geographic differences in health spending among a commercially insured population. While there is significant variation among areas, the pattern is different from that…
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Most seniors tend to purchase Medigap or Medicare Supplement insurance, which mutes the effect of Medicare's cost-sharing provisions, potentially increasing utilization and costs for the program. A Kaiser brief examines…
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A study reported in Health Affairs finds that American physicians spend much more time at a much higher cost interacting with insurers than do Canadian physicians, who only have to…
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Further evidence that hospitals with market power raise prices almost at will and disregard opportunities to cut costs is provided by research reported in Health Affairs. Hospitals in concentrated markets…
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This week's Potpourri features dropped malpractice claims, the quality benefits of EHRs, improper Medicare payments, health insurer customer satisfaction, the utilization and cost effects of using hospitalists, and determining if…
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Research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association finds that the onset of Part D prescription drug coverage helped reduce relative non-drug spending for those beneficiaries who previously…
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The Government Accounting Office examined various interventions designed to improve the quality of health care and/or lower costs and analyzed the strength of the evidence supporting the effect of the…
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Projections of national health expenditures through 2010 show a continued relentless upward trend, at a rate faster than GDP growth; with spending reaching 20% of GDP by the end of…
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About this Blog
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 khroche@healthy-skeptic.com.