Growth in Medicare spending has slowed substantially, driven primarily by lower spending on hospital care and prescription drugs, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Initiatives such as accountable care organizations and bundled care models that encourage better quality at lower costs are also generating savings for the Medicare program. Health plans are stepping up their focus on accountable care, and Medicare Advantage plans have made gains on chronic disease care and lower readmissions, according to an America's Health Insurance Plans spokeswoman.
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Medicare Advantage plans — private plans that serve as alternatives to the traditional, public program for those that qualify for it — underperform traditional Medicare in one respect: They cost 6 percent more.
But they outperform traditional Medicare in another way: They offer higher quality. That’s according to research summarized recently by the Harvard health economists Joseph Newhouse and Thomas McGuire, and it raises a difficult question: Is the extra quality worth the extra cost?
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13 August 2014
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National Business Group on Health
Health care benefit costs at large employers are expected to increase 6.5% in 2015, slightly lower than this year’s rate of increase. Most employers, however, say they will be able to stem increases even more as a result of changes they are making to their benefit plans, according to an annual survey released today by the National Business Group on Health, a non-profit association of nearly 400 large U.S. employers.
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Dr. Emad Rizk is set to assume leadership of hospital revenue-management company Accretive Health on July 21. Modern Healthcare recently interviewed Rizk, president of McKesson Health Solutions since 2003, about the revolution afoot in healthcare payment, with providers on a fast and rocky path from fee-for-service to value-based models.
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Hannaford is incentivizing shoppers to buy healthier foods with discounts on select store-brand purchases.
The retailer is providing 24 electronic coupons for store brand carrots, peanuts, kale and other health and wellness foods, according to NutriSavings, the corporate wellness company that provides the platform.
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A growing slate of grocery retailers nationwide have adopted the employee-sponsored NutriSavings health and wellness program, which incentivizes the buying of nutritious foods for shoppers at the grocery store.
Currently available to employees of East Coast-based Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, and most recently MaineHealth, a Portland-based healthcare network, NutriSavings offers those enrolled a series of financial rewards, digital tools including nutrition panels and ingredient lists, and healthy recipes and tips.
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Through the company-funded initiative, Harvard Pilgrim employees can earn up to $20 every month as an incentive to improve their grocery shopping and eating habits. Harvard Pilgrim employer groups will be able to design their own rewards programs.
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The cash incentives are a new perk that Harvard Pilgrim launched for its 1,200 workers in April and plans to introduce to employer health plans later this year.
The company, which insures 1.2 million people through 20,000 employers, will be the first insurer in the state and among the first in the country to offer a benefit that links cash rewards with healthy grocery shopping.
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Data on healthcare payments shows how drastically
the industry has shifted in recent years. Consumers
have become decision-makers who are sensitive to
healthcare costs, and payers and providers are moving
toward industry-standard, electronic transactions
due to regulatory mandates and high administrative
costs. These changes present both challenges and
opportunities for payers to focus on the consumer
and streamline processes to ultimately reduce costs.
more»
Data on healthcare payments shows how drastically
the industry has shifted in recent years. Consumers
have become decision-makers who are sensitive to
healthcare costs, and payers and providers are moving
toward industry-standard, electronic transactions
due to regulatory mandates and high administrative
costs. These changes present both challenges and
opportunities for payers to focus on the consumer
and streamline processes to ultimately reduce costs.
more»
Data on healthcare payments shows how drastically
the industry has shifted in recent years. Consumers
have become decision-makers who are sensitive to
healthcare costs, and payers and providers are moving
toward industry-standard, electronic transactions
due to regulatory mandates and high administrative
costs. These changes present both challenges and
opportunities for payers to focus on the consumer
and streamline processes to ultimately reduce costs.
more»
Call it the triumph of irrationality over self-interest.
Healthcare experts and pharmacy leaders have been grappling with the challenge of patient nonadherence for decades. They’ve spent countless hours trying to understand why patients often don’t act in their own therapeutic best interests, even when they know the health risks they incur by failing to take their medicines as prescribed.
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Following her appearance at the 2nd Annual World Congress Summit to Improve Adherence & Enhance Patient Engagement in Philadelphia, Kristi Rudkin, senior director of product development for Walgreens, spoke with DSN about the company’s efforts to boost patients’ adherence rates. Here are excerpts from that interview...
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With half of all patients not taking their medications as prescribed, efforts to engage patients more effectively and boost adherence rates have become critical for pharmacy leaders. Here, we discuss how CVS Caremark is addressing the challenge with William Shrank, M.D. the company’s chief medical officer for provider innovation and analytics. Shrank recently spoke at the 2nd Annual World Congress Summit to Improve Adherence & Enhance Patient Engagement, sponsored by MWV Healthcare.
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HumanaVitality, the health insurer’s employee wellness program that uses rewards and social features to encourage healthy behavior change, has released some data based on a two-year study of 16,000 employees.
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The U.S. healthcare payments market is growing at
a rapid pace – reaching an estimated $2.7 trillion,
as a total of both payer and consumer payments.1
However, administrative costs are estimated to
consume 25 to 40 cents of every dollar spent in
the healthcare industry.2 These costs are poised to
increase as changes due to reform and consumerism
reshape the healthcare payments industry at a
staggering pace.
more»
The U.S. healthcare payments market is growing at
a rapid pace – reaching an estimated $2.7 trillion,
as a total of both payer and consumer payments.1
However, administrative costs are estimated to
consume 25 to 40 cents of every dollar spent in
the healthcare industry.2 These costs are poised to
increase as changes due to reform and consumerism
reshape the healthcare payments industry at a
staggering pace.
more»
The U.S. healthcare payments market is growing at
a rapid pace – reaching an estimated $2.7 trillion,
as a total of both payer and consumer payments.1
However, administrative costs are estimated to
consume 25 to 40 cents of every dollar spent in
the healthcare industry.2 These costs are poised to
increase as changes due to reform and consumerism
reshape the healthcare payments industry at a
staggering pace.
more»
Employers have been largely responsible for the healthcare coverage of Americans since World War II, when employers starting paying for healthcare coverage as a means of supplementing workers beyond wage limits.
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