View Message in Browser

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

mailto:[email protected]

[link removed]

A Weekly Health Policy Round Up From Health Affairs            

**January 26, 2020**

[link removed]

THIS WEEK ON THE BLOG

FOLLOWING THE ACA

Supreme Court Denies Expedited Review Of Texas

By Katie Keith (1/21/20)

Today the Supreme Court denied a request from 21 Democratic attorneys
general and the US House of Representatives to expedite review of Texas
v. United States. Read More >>

PUBLIC HEALTH

Improving Public Health Practice Capacity In Governmental Settings: A
Proposal

By Ronald O. Valdiserri (1/23/20)

Expanded collaborations between schools and programs of public health
and state and local departments of health have the potential to improve
population health outcomes by creating a strong and durable governmental
public health workforce. Read More >>

ACCESS TO CARE

From Hospital To Home: Why Nutrition Counts

By Wendy Everett, Christina Badaracco, and Sharon McCauley (1/24/20)

It is time to recognize the essential role that nutrition plays in
health and make policy and clinical practice changes to carry out
effective post-hospital nutrition care. Read More >>

DISEASES

One Step Closer To Ending Leprosy

By Ann Aerts (1/24/20)

While we still don't know everything there is to know about leprosy,
we do know that we already have the tools, the partnership models, and
the evidence to be able to put the world on a path toward eradication.
Read More >>

ACCESS TO CARE

Vaccine Infrastructure And Education Is The Best Medical Investment Our
Country Can Make

By J. Nadine Gracia and Amy Pisani (1/21/20)

We are seeing an increase in preventable infectious disease outbreaks,
gaps in long-standing vaccine practices, and a growth in
sociodemographic disparities in vaccination rates, particularly among
children who live in rural areas or who are uninsured. Solutions will
require a renewed commitment to disease elimination, adequate funding,
and enhanced bipartisan cooperation. Read More >>

FOOD

The Trump Administration's Continued Attack On The Nutrition Safety
Net: At What Cost?

By Swapna Reddy, Gregory Sprout, and Jessica Lehmann (1/22/20)

Simple math makes it clear that keeping Americans adequately fed through
SNAP pays off in the long run for the nation. Read More >>

HEALTH AFFAIRS BRANDED POST

The Value of Medicare Advantage: Coverage Security, Consumer Choice, and
Lower Costs

By Allyson Y. Schwartz and Griffin Myers (1/22/20)
Supported by theBetter Medicare Alliance

Consumer choice and coverage security. These phrases are often bandied
about as partisan buzzwords in the health care reform debates of today,
depicted as mutually exclusive values in service to the political
narrative. Read More >>

[link removed]

IN THE JOURNAL

MEDICARE

Spending And Quality After Three Years Of Medicare's Voluntary Bundled
Payment For Joint Replacement Surgery

By Amol S. Navathe, Ezekiel J. Emanuel, Atheendar S. Venkataramani, Qian
Huang, Atul Gupta, Claire T. Dinh, Eric Z. Shan, Dylan Small, Norma B.
Coe, Erkuan Wang, Xinshuo Ma, Jingsan Zhu, Deborah S. Cousins, and
Joshua M. Liao

Amol Navathe and coauthors report on the results of Medicare's Bundled
Payments for Care Improvement (BPCI) initiative after three years. They
find that "participation in [BPCI] was associated with a 1.6 percent
decrease in average lower extremity joint replacement episode spending,
driven by the performance of early participants, with no changes in
quality."
Read More >>

[link removed]

AHEAD OF PRINT

Differences In Starting Pay For Male And Female Physicians Persist;
Explanations For The Gender Gap Remain Elusive

By Anthony T. Lo Sasso, David Armstrong, Gaetano Forte, and Susan E.
Gerber

Anthony Lo Sasso and coauthors examined survey data for graduating
medical residents and fellows in New York State for the years
1999-2017. They found that during this period, the average starting
compensation was $235,044 for men and $198,426 for women, with a larger
gap in more recent years than in earlier years. Approximately 60 percent
of the gap in starting salary could be explained primarily by
differences in specialty and hours spent in patient care. Read More >>

PHARMACEUTICALS & MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY

The Effect Of Veterans Health Administration Coverage On Cost-Related
Medication Nonadherence

By Adam Gaffney, David H. Bor, David U. Himmelstein, Steffie
Woolhandler, and Danny McCormick

Cost sharing for prescription drugs, even among people with health
insurance, can be a barrier to adhering to medication regimens. Adam
Gaffney and coauthors compare adherence among those with Veterans Health
Administration coverage, which has very limited cost sharing, to that
among people with prescription drug coverage that is less comprehensive.
Read More >>

COSTS & SPENDING

National Health Care Spending In 2018: Growth Driven By Accelerations In
Medicare And Private Insurance Spending

By Micah Hartman, Anne B. Martin, Joseph Benson, Aaron Catlin, and
The National Health Expenditure Accounts Team

This new analysis from the Office of the Actuary at the Centers for
Medicare and Medicaid Services estimates that in 2018 health care
spending in the United States grew at a rate of 4.6 percent to $3.6
trillion, or $11,172 per person. The 4.6 percent growth rate in 2018 was
faster than that of 4.2 percent in 2017 but was equal to the rate in
2016. The 0.4-percentage-point acceleration in overall growth in 2018
was driven by faster growth in private health insurance spending and
Medicare. For the second year in a row, the number of uninsured people
increased by 1.0 million, reaching 30.7 million in 2018. Read More >>

HOSPITALS

Out-Of-Network Billing And Negotiated Payments For Hospital-Based
Physicians

By Zack Cooper, Hao Nguyen, Nathan Shekita, and Fiona Scott Morton

Most recently, attention on out-of-network billing has been focused on
patients receiving large, unexpected physician bills. However, the
impact of out-of-network billing on total health care spending is also
significant, according to Zack Cooper and coauthors from Yale
University. Analyzing data from a large commercial insurer, the authors
found that at in-network hospitals, 11.8 percent of anesthesiology care,
12.3 percent of care involving a pathologist, 5.6 percent of claims for
radiologists, and 11.3 percent of cases involving an assistant surgeon
were billed out of network. Read More >>

[link removed]

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

 

[link removed]

About Health Affairs

Health Affairs is the leading peer-reviewed journal
at the intersection of health,
health care, and policy. Published monthly by Project HOPE, the journal
is available in print and online. Late-breaking content is also found
through healthaffairs.org , Health Affairs
Today , and Health Affairs
Sunday Update .  

Project HOPE is a global health and
humanitarian relief organization that places power in the hands of local
health care workers to save lives across the globe. Project HOPE has
published Health Affairs since 1981.

Copyright © Project HOPE: The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.

Health Affairs, 7500 Old Georgetown Road, Suite 600, Bethesda, MD 20814, United States

Privacy Policy

To unsubscribe from this email, click here
.                 
                                               
                        I