Health junction

Hospital and Medical Procedure Price Transparency-The Next Health Care Consumer Reform Given the mandated personal responsibility for health insurance, pay for performance Affordable Care Act methodology, and increased reporting of insurance plan administrative data, it is clear that consumer driven health care is launched.   However, one piece of the puzzle is still missing, which is an understanding of the cost of a procedure before you have it done at your chosen facility. Increasingly there has been consumer demand for better disclosure of health care pricing which has resulted in a number of legislative proposals across the country. Also, one state created a unique and highly effective payment model for hospital services over forty years ago and it may be the future for a workable streamlined national model for reimbursement. This article reviews data from the nonprofit organization, National Conference for State Legislation.org, as well as state public health, and the Medica...

Insurance Exchange Triage Long wait times, changes in coverage for those covered under high risk pools, and changes in provider networks are some of the problems which have occurred with the national insurance exchange implementation. This article provides pragmatic advice for those seeking insurance through an exchange, working with an agency who has to implement some of the mandates, and who want straight talk on how to accomplish your mission. First and foremost, apart from the standardization of insurance coverage and national role out of a quasi national health care policy, much of the griping over the exchange implementation is merely a ramped up �open enrollment process� which occurs annually for those covered by private insurance plans. To help allay some of the misconceptions, each of the concerns are addressed below. Timely Processing of Insurance Exchange Applications Firstly, we can all acknowledge that the federal exchange roll-out has been problematic and now let�s move ...