Coordination of benefits is a critical pillar of the Medicaid program as it ensures the efficient use of resources, prevents overutilization, promotes equity in resource distribution, mitigates fraud and abuse, contributes to program longevity and ultimately enhances healthcare access for beneficiaries.
Jill DeGraff, B.well Connected Health’s senior vice president of regulatory, believes the ONC’s new HTI-1 rule is a step in the right direction that will improve data exchange for providers, health tech vendors and patients. She applauded the rule for preserving TEFCA as a voluntary framework and for establishing FHIR-based interoperability as the industry’s de facto standard.
Canada has a proud history of achievement in the areas of science and technology, and the field of biomanufacturing and life sciences is no exception.
In predicting that the Medi-Cal coverage protections during the pandemic would end, advocates successfully pushed for California to adopt a continuous Medi-Cal coverage policy for children ages 0-5 – avoiding annual renewals during this vulnerable time in their childhood development. For this important protection to become a reality as soon as possible, we now need the Governor to fund and greenlight this policy immediately–in his January 2024 Budget proposal.
As we embark on the winter season, the significance of respiratory health becomes even more pronounced. The challenges posed by cold weather, compounded by air pollution, necessitate a proactive approach.
It is only by supporting the public health workers, and making their jobs more appealing that health agencies can strengthen the workforce to prevent and respond to future public health threats.
Hospitals that are able to transform what they are and how they operate can survive and serve the public well. They will still require investments from society in the interim, but that investment will be justified by the public good and eventually represent a windfall to taxpayers.
Changes in HHS structure, along with well-funded and staffed partners at the state, local, tribal and territorial levels, may prove helpful for success during future public health emergencies and can help earn and maintain the public’s trust.
Standard newborn screening can detect dozens of inherited diseases, but genomics technology enables testing for hundreds of them. A North Carolina program evaluating the feasibility of bringing genomics to newborn screening is expanding with an initial goal of testing 5,000 babies in the next year.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has announced two value-based care alternative payment models set to launch in July 2024, one focused on dementia and one on primary care.
As the debate over worker misclassification rages, it's important that healthcare professionals know the facts. Staffing agencies that designate their nurses as independent contractors avoid the costs of employment-related benefits like insurance, workers’ compensation, and overtime pay. These agencies also lack necessary clinical and professional oversight over their contractors, which increases the risk of substandard care.
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
To improve public health outcomes, not only at the local and national level, but also globally, we need to invest in hygiene research and those who seek to solve hygiene-related issues.
CMS recently proposed a $9 billion lump sum payment to remedy illegal payment cuts for 340B drugs from 2018 to 2022. In general, hospital groups have reacted positively to the fact that 340B providers will receive lump sum payments but have expressed concern about CMS’ methods for maintaining budget neutrality with this plan.
Health tech experts explained the nuances of healthcare data management and ways in which patient data can be cleaned, converted, standardized and harmonized across systems
It is critical for policymakers to work with nephology RNs to increase federal resources that will enable us to address burnout, decrease turnover rates, and build and support a stronger healthcare workforce nationwide.
By leveraging its large membership, Medicare could by embracing value-based contracting significantly influence the pharmaceutical market, pitting competing drugs against each other, or encouraging pharmaceutical makers to figure out ways to deliver drugs more cheaply.
