Medicine & Health articles from October 2003

Medicine & Health archives from October 2003

Decade-long drop in employer coverage continues ...(Insurance Coverage)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... The percentage of workers in private industry with employer-sponsored health insurance has dropped gradually over a decade, from 63 percent in 1993 to 45 percent by March 2003, says the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics in a new analysis. ...

Hospital finances still a guessing game for analysts.(In Medicine & Health Perspectives this week ...)
October 6, 2003... This is the second part of a two-part Perspectives outlining some recent expert analysis of hospital finances. The first part appeared Sept. 29. With two decades passed since Medicare began paying hospitals based on diagnoses and episodes...

... As Medicaid growth ameliorates uninsured stats.(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... While employer-sponsored coverage decreased in 2002, public coverage grew, says the Census Bureau. The percentage of people covered by government-sponsored health insurance rose from 25.3 to 25.7 percent from 2001 to 2002, largely as a result...

NIH director may get more power.(NIH Elias Zerhouni)
October 6, 2003... National Institutes of Health Director Elias Zerhouni, MD, proposed Sept. 30 to fundamentally reshape his agency's work, from basic research through translation of discoveries into treatments. The "roadmap," as NIH calls the plan,...

Five reasons to worry about federal deficits.(Federal Budget)
October 6, 2003... Federal budget deficits now and over the next decades will be bigger--much bigger--than the Congressional Budget Office projects, and everybody has ample reason to care. U.S. Comptroller General David Walker, of the General Accounting Office,...

Health-center reach cuts disparities on key measures.(Racial and Ethnic Disparities)
October 6, 2003... Medicaid alone does little to alleviate racial and ethnic health disparities, but Medicaid buttressed by community health centers accessible to large numbers of low-income people does the job very well indeed. That's the finding of a...

Quality spotty, says NCQA ...(Quality of Care National Committee for Quality Assurance)
October 6, 2003... Poor quality health care kills over 57,000 Americans each year, the National Committee for Quality Assurance says in the 2004 version of its annual health-care quality report. These are not deaths caused by medical error, but deaths of...

... As HealthGrades spotlights variation.(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... Similar regional variations in quality emerge from the newest hospital report card from HealthGrades, a company that provides healthcare information and advisory services to consumers, health plans, and providers. HealthGrades found that...

Medicare negotiators moving towards covering duals, away from plan limit.(In Other News)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... In a victory for the nation's governors and a defeat for the administration, House and Senate Medicare negotiators appear headed towards making Medicare the primary vehicle for providing pharmaceutical coverage to seniors eligible for both...

Six more months for QI-1, TMA, and standardized hospital payment.(In Other News)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... Late on Sept. 30, Congress approved HR 3146, giving short-term reauthorizations to several programs just before they were slated to expire at midnight with fiscal year 2003. The president signed the bill Oct. 1. Extended through March 31,...

Finance leaders propose extending TAA credit to unemployed.(In Other News trade adjustment assistance)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... Senate Finance Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and senior Democrat Max Baucus (MT) propose to extend the trade adjustment assistance tax credit --which provides a 65 percent health-insurance premium subsidy to trade-displaced workers--to...

Therapy caps go into effect.(In Other News)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... Unless and until Congress declares otherwise, the oft postponed Medicare therapy caps are in effect. For the period from Sept. 1 through Dec. 31, beneficiaries face a combined $1,590 limit on outpatient physical therapy and speech language...

Blues launch cost and quality initiative.(In Other News BlueCross BlueShield Association )
October 6, 2003... In partnership with Harvard Medical School's division of public policy, the BlueCross BlueShield Association will evaluate and disseminate initiatives developed by regional plans to decrease health-care spending growth and improve quality of...

Tobacco regulation looks dead this year.(In Other News)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... Senate talks on giving the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate tobacco products have broken down, probably dooming the effort until at least next year. Public-health groups and Democrats said language pushed by Republicans...

National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Director Claude Lenfant, MD, retired from more than two decades at the helm of the agency on August 30.(People)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Director Claude Lenfant, MD, retired from more than two decades at the helm of the agency on August 30. A staff member of the National Institutes of Health beginning in 1971, Lenfant took over was named...

Fred Rickles, MD, has joined the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology as executive director.(People)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... Fred Rickles, MD, has joined the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology as executive director. Previously, he was professor of medicine and pediatrics and associate vice president for research at the George Washington...

Lee Goldberg, former communications chief at the National Committee to Preserve Social Security, has joined the Service Employees International Union.(People)(Brief Article)
October 6, 2003... Lee Goldberg, former communications chief at the National Committee to Preserve Social Security, has joined the Service Employees International Union. She'll direct long-term-care policy initiatives at SEIU.

Scully disappointed with hospital reporting.(Hospital Quality)
October 13, 2003... Last December's agreement by the hospital industry to begin voluntary reporting of quality data bore its first tangible fruit Oct. 9, when industry and government officials and other stakeholders unveiled a Web site featuring ten quality...

Health care in forefront of security needs, say analysts.(In Medicine & Health Perspectives this week ...)
October 13, 2003... Add more constituencies to those who would push the health-care system toward population-based health and prevention: Scientists and analysts working in the fields of terrorism, biosecurity, and emerging infectious disease say that a new...

Rother: fallback likely, premium support doubtful.(Medicare Conference)
October 13, 2003... Medicare conferees likely will achieve agreements in principle on the major issues by Oct. 17, top AARP health lobbyist John Rother predicted Oct. 8. That wouldn't quite meet the deadline imposed by House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) and...

Could Bush propose per capita cap for Medicaid.(Medicaid)
October 13, 2003... The Bush administration continues urging states to accept its capped-funding plan for Medicaid, but details of the proposal still seem to be in flux, judging from comments made by Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Tom...

Commerce just says no to further FMAP aid.
October 13, 2003... For its part, the Commerce panel had promised to spearhead a major congressional overhaul of Medicaid this year, but the Oct. 8 hearing suggested that the committee hasn't settled on specifics. Members seek "opportunities to better focus...

Thorpe: 4.1 million would lose retiree benefits.(Medicare/Employer Coverage)
October 13, 2003... About 33 percent of seniors with employer-based retiree drug coverage would lose it as a result of either the House or the Senate Medicare bill becoming law, but that number could be reduced by about a third, to 20-25 percent, through $1...

Medicare and private payers crave AWP alternatives.(Outpatient Drugs)
October 13, 2003... Much like Medicare, private insurers see few good alternatives to the average-wholesale-price method of paying for physician-administered drugs. But both public and private payers say AWP-based reimbursement is rife with overpayment. Two groups...

New methods sparse doctors Leery.
October 13, 2003... Some plans are trying new methods, though the methods haven't been independently evaluated, analysts from Georgetown University and the University of Chicago note in their study. Two plans report that alternate methods have saved them between...

Medicare drugs for duals: White House bargaining chip on Medicaid capped-fund plan?(In Other News)
October 13, 2003... The Bush administration continues to believe that people dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid should continue receiving prescription-drug coverage through Medicaid, if a Medicare drug benefit is enacted, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid...

Davis signs 'pay or play' bill.(In Other News)
October 13, 2003... On Oct. 5, two days before being recalled by California voters, outgoing Gov. Gray Davis (D) signed a bill requiring employers to offer health insurance to workers or contribute to a state coverage fund. The new "pay or play" law, which takes...

CBO lowers FY 2003 deficit estimate.(In Other News)
October 13, 2003... The Congressional Budget Office Oct. 9 estimated the fiscal year 2003 budget deficit at $374 billion. That's still a record in dollar terms and more than twice 2002's shortfall, but it's down from CBO's August projection for FY 2003, which...

Underwriters don't see big shift to consumer-directed plans.(In Other News)
October 13, 2003... Employers are increasing health-plan cost sharing for workers, but there's little sign so far of a big-time shift to so-called consumer-directed coverage. That's according to the annual benefit-trends buying study from the ChapterHouse...

VA health votes to establish Research Oversight office.(In Other News)
October 13, 2003... Legislation approved Oct. 8 by a House panel would create a watchdog office to ensure the safety of human subjects and research animals in studies conducted by the Department of Veterans Affairs. HR 1585 would establish an independent...

Supremes let stand fetal homicide conviction, forcible medication for execution.(In Other News)
October 13, 2003... In its first set of orders for the new term, the United States Supreme Court Oct. 6 refused to hear the appeal of Regina McKnight, who was convicted of killing her unborn child through cocaine use. In upholding McKnight's homicide-by-child...

American Institutes for Research.(People)
October 13, 2003... Former Urban Institute scholar Marilyn Moon is now vice president for health programs at the American Institutes for Research.

Commonwealth Fund.(People)
October 13, 2003... Bill Silberg joins the Commonwealth Fund as vice president for communications and publishing. A long-time member of the publishing staff at the American Medical Association, he most recently was Medscape senior vice president and executive...

American Association of Health Plans.(People)
October 13, 2003... John Kaelin has been named executive director for government programs policy at the American Association of Health Plans. A former budgetary and health official for New York State, Kaelin most recently led the University of Maryland's Center...

Hospitals slip-slidin' away from leapfrog CPOE goals.(Patient Safety Measures)
October 20, 2003... Hoping that big private-sector health-care purchasers can nudge hospitals toward widespread adoption of computerized order systems, which could reduce medical errors? Don't hold your breath. Last week federal Medicare chief Tom Scully...

Bioterror fears, medical-data deluge drive e-records push.(Perspectives this week ...)
October 20, 2003... This is the first in a Perspectives series on electronic health records that M&H will publish periodically over the next several weeks. Move over, HIPAA. Here comes the ultimate information-technology challenge: implementing an...

PPO demo mostly serves same areas as M+C HMOS.(Medicare PPO Demo)
October 20, 2003... With congressional negotiators debating how to involve more preferred provider organizations in Medicare, all eyes may soon be on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' demo designed to determine how best to pay and manage PPOs in...

Study says bone marrow cells not so versatile.(Stem Cells)
October 20, 2003... New research casts doubt on hopes that adult bone marrow cells possess the ability to transform into different types of tissues such as heart, liver, and brain. This sort of plasticity would be key for the practice of "regenerative...

GOP leaders' medicare deadline passes sans deal.(Medicare)
October 20, 2003... To no one's surprise, House and Senate negotiators will not produce compromise legislation revamping Medicare and adding a prescription drug benefit by Oct. 17, the deadline set a month ago by Republican Capitol Hill leaders. And at least as...

Movement towards income-relating the Part B premium.(Medicare)
October 20, 2003... * Movement Towards Income-Relating the Part B Premium. Breaux (D-LA) and others have indicated that the conference is moving towards charging higher-income beneficiaries a higher premium for Medicare Part B, which covers physician and hospital...

As go the Cubs and the Red Sox, so goes a separate agency for private plans.(Medicare)
October 20, 2003... * As Go The Cubs And the Red Sox, So Goes A Separate Agency For Private Plans. Confirming earlier reports, Breaux told the New York Times that conferees had abandoned plans to establish a separate agency to oversee the array of new private...

More money to keep employers in the game.(Medicare)
October 20, 2003... * More Money To Keep Employers In the Game. Spooked by predictions from the Congressional Budget Office and others that roughly a third of seniors with employer-based retiree coverage could lose it under either the House and Senate bill, the...

HSAs, but not HSSAs.(Medicare)
October 20, 2003... * HSAs, But Not HSSAs. Grassley told reporters Oct. 14 that conferees were no longer considering the so-called Health Savings Security Accounts that the House included in HR 1. HSSAs, which would cost upwards of $163 billion over 10 years,...

New managed care laws don't equal new lawsuits.(Health Plan Liability)
October 20, 2003... Health plans in the ten states that have passed managed care liability laws in recent years are no more likely to be sued than plans in states lacking such laws, according to a study published in the journal Health Affairs. "Overall,...

Pentagon finds no defense against rising health costs.(Health-Care Spending)
October 20, 2003... The cost of providing peacetime health care for military personnel and their dependents is rising at the same high rates as other health costs. Annual spending per active-duty service member nearly tripled between 1988 and 2003, from $6,600 to...

CMS sets itself deadlines for coverage determination.(Medicare Coverage Appeals)
October 20, 2003... Beginning Oct. 27, Medicare national coverage determinations will follow newly defined tracks, with established deadlines, under a revised process announced in the Sept. 26 Federal Register. An NCD "is a national policy statement granting,...

Senate votes to ban genetic discrimination.(In Other News)
October 20, 2003... * Senate Votes To Ban Genetic Discrimination. Capping a decade's worth of effort, the Senate voted unanimously Oct. 15 to bar the use of genetic information in health insurance underwriting and employment decisions. The legislation passed...

High court won't hear medical marijuana case.(In Other News)
October 20, 2003... * High Court Won't Hear Medical Marijuana Case. The U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 14 declined to hear the government's appeal of Conant v. Walters, which barred federal authorities from punishing or investigating physicians who recommend marijuana...

Rise for Part B premium, like other premiums, in double digits.(In Other News)
October 20, 2003... * Rise For Part B Premium, Like Other Premiums, In Double Digits. The premium for Medicare Part B, which covers physician and hospital outpatient services, will rise by 13.5 percent in 2004, the Department of Health and Human Services announced...

Uninsurance, public coverage high in remotest areas.(In Other News)
October 20, 2003... * Uninsurance, Public Coverage High In Remotest Areas. Policies intended to increase health coverage must take into account the lower likelihood that people in the remotest rural areas can get insurance through their jobs, according to an issue...

Washington Business Group.(People)
October 20, 2003... LuAnn Heinen is director of the Washington Business Group on Health's Institute on the Costs and Health Effects of Obesity. Previously, she's been a vice president for health policy with the UnitedHealth Group and vice president for business...

Sue Fryer Ward now directs grassroots activities for the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare.(People)
October 20, 2003... Sue Fryer Ward now directs grassroots activities for the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare. A longtime government official managing aging issues for Maryland, she was named the state's first secretary of aging in 1998....

Generic Pharmaceutical Association.(People)
October 20, 2003... Bruce Lott, late of the media relations department at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, is senior director for state affairs at the Generic Pharmaceutical Association.

Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America.(People)
October 20, 2003... Ed Belkin is vice president of communications at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. Earlier, he was communications director for former Sen. Dave Durenberger (R-MN). Most recently, Belkin was a senior vice president in the...

Insecurity, rising costs put health near top of agenda: health care and 2004 elections.
October 27, 2003... Insecurity--about terrorism and the war in Iraq, but also about their own family finances--will be at the top of voters' minds during the run-up to 2004 elections, two national pollsters told an audience of health-care and political reporters...

Medicare negotiations progress, but obstacles remain.(In Medicine & Health Perspectives this week ...)
October 27, 2003... As Medicine & Health went to press on the morning of Oct. 24, Medicare negotiators were meeting, still trying to hammer out the conceptual deal that Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA) and others had suggested would be at hand by today. The conferees...

Seniors' home equity eyed as key to paying LTC bills: long term care.
October 27, 2003... Seniors have $1.5 trillion in paid-off home mortgages--a substantial national asset that should be tapped to pay for long-term-care costs to ease the burdens now borne by Medicaid. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Tom...

Abortion procedure ban advances: reproductive rights.
October 27, 2003... By a 64 to 34 margin, the Senate Oct. 21 voted to ban what opponents call "partial birth" abortions. The bill, already passed by the House, now goes to President Bush for his promised signature. Advocates of abortion rights have promised...

CDC focus shifts from shots to general preparedness: smallpox.
October 27, 2003... The federal government's much ballyhooed smallpox vaccination campaign has slowed to what can barely be described as a crawl. But the slowdown is allowing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to focus on what should have been...

Bush and Rx bill: he's gotta have it, pollster says: Medicare and 2004 elections.
October 27, 2003... Some Republicans have been voicing fears that a Medicare drug bill seniors don't like much could be a political liability for the party in 2004 elections. But GOP pollster Bill McInturff told health reporters Oct. 20 that President Bush needs a...

Views differ on employer response to Rx bill: retiree benefits.
October 27, 2003... One of the biggest headaches for Medicare negotiators has been worry that a new, broad-based Medicare drug benefit would accelerate the already disturbing trend of employers dropping retiree benefits. In a Sept. 13 paper, for instance, Emory...

CMS to hire 100 Medicaid-maximization cops.(In Other News)
October 27, 2003... CMS To Hire 100 Medicaid-Maximization Cops. The White House Office of Management and Budget has approved hiring 100 new federal employees to head off the stream of federal Medicaid dollars that go to what are known as states' "Medicaid...

HIAAAAHP!(In Other News)
October 27, 2003... It's official. Members of the American Association of Health Plans and the Health Insurance Association of America approved the merger of the two lobbies in an Oct. 21 vote. Until a new name is found, the king-sized group--whose members insure...

Health plan-sponsored study sees more opportunity for savings.(In Other News)
October 27, 2003... Pennsylvania's senior prescription-drug assistance program--suggested by some as a model for how to provide a Medicare drug benefit--could shave 40 percent off its costs by using the full panoply of management tools available, according to...

Scully says he's a rules boy.(In Other News)
October 27, 2003... Confounding the oversimplified "market versus regulation" take that is often imposed on the current Medicare debate, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Tom Scully said Oct. 22 that "the reason Medicare works with private...

And at these prices!(In Other News)
October 27, 2003... Among Medicaid issues the Bush administration will focus on in 2004, CMS deputy chief Leslie Norwalk told Medicaid managed-care organizations Oct. 23: the "desperate need" to rein in spending on care for the sickest, lowest-income elderly,...

Medicare Payment Advisory Commission.(People)
October 27, 2003... Sarah Thomas has been named deputy executive director at the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, for whom she's previously served as publications director and as a director of research. Thomas has held policy positions with the Congressional...

Teresa Houser.(People)
October 27, 2003... Teresa Houser has departed the Federation of American Hospitals, where she was vice president for legislation and political affairs, to become a special assistant to Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Administrator Tom Scully.

FAH.(People)
October 27, 2003... Replacing Houser at FAH is Jayne Hart Chambers. She directed congressional affairs at the American Medical Association and most recently presided over political affairs at the College of American Pathologists.

National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare.(People)
October 27, 2003... Named policy research director at the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare is Maria Freese, formerly a tax counsel for the Senate Finance Committee. Earlier, she was legislative director for former Rep. Lewis Payne...

National Quality Forum.(People)
October 27, 2003... At the National Quality Forum, Phil Dunn becomes vice president for communications and public affairs. A health-care writer, Dunn most recently was senior editor of the American Hospital Association's monthly journal, Hospitals & Health...