The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the current cost over the next ten years of repealing the SGR physician payment formula and using a zero update during that time is $116 billion and replacing it with a .5% annual update is $136 billion. This cost is down substantially from the $271 billion repeal cost estimated a couple of years ago.
An AHRQ Statistical Brief shows that for the Medicare population in 2010 the top 5 classes of drug use were metabolic, cardiovascular, CNS, respiratory and gastrointestinal, accounting for $63 billion and 68% of all Medicare drug spending.
Practice Fusion has closed on the final $15 million of its Series D round, bring the total capital invested in the company to $149 million. Good luck getting a nice return on that.
Consumers are waking up to the reality of worse coverage for many policies purchased on the insurance exchanges under the reform law, according to a Wall Street Journal story.
Dabo Health, which originally was invested in by the Mayo Clinic, has attracted $2 million in additional financing to support its product which helps providers track their performance on quality measures.
Telecom New Zealand is putting as much as $5 million into Vigil Wireless Monitoring, which has a wristband that monitors and communicates biometric readings.
A Statistical Brief from AHRQ looks at preventable hospitalizations, finding that they fell 6% for adults and 40% for children from 2005 to 2010, saving about 2% of adult hospital spending and 32% of pediatric hospital spending. In a couple of areas, however, potentially avoidable hospital stays increased, notably for hypertension, up over 30%, and diabetic complications, up over 20%.
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.
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.
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