The Senate Finance Committee voted today in favor of its version of proposed healthcare reform legislation in a 14-9 vote, including the approval of Olympia Snowe, R.-Me.
The medical devices industry is lobbying heavily to reduce a projected $4 billion annual tax on medical device makers included in the Senate Finance Committee healthcare reform bill, according to media reports.
The healthcare reform bill approved last week by the House Energy and Commerce Committee contained an amendment prohibiting the federal government from using comparative-effectiveness research to “deny or ration care.”
President Barack Obama Sunday released plans to cut in half the prescription drug expenses of Medicare Part D beneficiaries who have reached the coverage gap (doughnut hole) in their prescription benefit. Simultaneously, pharmaceutical companies have agreed to foot the bill for $80 billion in Medicare drugs over the next decade for this population.
The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, led by Chairman Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., introduced legislation this week advocating for more government involvement in healthcare coverage. The bill is certain to launch a drawn-out debate over the current delivery direction of healthcare in the United States when it is introduced on the Senate floor in July.
Thursday, May 07 2009
GE today launched a new healthcare business strategy, healthymagination, dedicating $6 billion to preventive care and consumer-driven initiatives. The new strategy was announced in a live webcast, hosted by Jeff Immelt, chairman and CEO of GE.
Imaging provisions contained in the Senate Finance Committee's proposals for healthcare delivery reform are "forward-thinking" policies that will ensure proper diagnostic imaging utilization over the long term, according to the Access to Medical Imaging Coalition (AMIC).
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has released a report approximating the costs of the current updated economic stimulus package currently being debated in the Senate, as well as estimating its assistance to the U.S. healthcare system.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., released a “Call to Action” plan on Wednesday, detailing his vision for health reform in the 111th Congress, which highlights access to care, unsustainable costs and a lack of quality assurances that currently plague the U.S. healthcare system.
|
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation have released a preliminary analysis of the Senate healthcare reform legislation, Chairman’s Mark for the America’s Healthy Future Act of 2009, estimating the bill would reduce federal budget deficits by $81 billion over the 2010–2019 period.
The Senate Finance Committee, chaired by Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., issued its long-awaited America’s Healthy Future Act of 2009 on Wednesday, which would cost $856 billion over 10 years, and is scheduled to begin committee action on Sept. 22.
A report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released June 22 has revealed that "significant gaps" in access to screening and treatment services for breast and cervical cancer exist both between states and within states, according to the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Advocacy Alliance.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, D-N.D., introduced legislation to establish a private, nonprofit corporation that will research and compare clinical outcomes of alternative therapies and health strategies.
Healthcare reform cannot survive on expanding coverage alone; it requires promoting best practices to fix what is broken, wrote President Barack Obama in a letter sent June 2 to Sens. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., and Max Baucus, D-Mont.,--the two key stakeholders who have been at odds over the payor component of the administration's healthcare reform plan.
An average of 14,000 Americans lose health coverage each day, healthcare insurance premiums grow more than three times faster than wages and physician reimbursement has declined by more than 20 percent in the past eight years. Couple these sad statistics with a demographic shift that will see an ever increasing number of U.S. citizens eligible for, and needing services from, Medicare and it becomes clear that present healthcare delivery policies are quickly becoming fiscally unsustainable.
In the first of three roundtables on healthcare delivery system reform held by the Senate Finance Committee, participants this week discussed increasing primary care physician payments by reducing payments to imaging services providers.
Medicare Part A payments for conditions like heart attacks and other illnesses may soon be linked to hospital performance on a variety of quality measures, according to a discussion draft of a bill proposed by Sens. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.
|
RSS 
Using an advanced massive-training artificial neural network, computer-aided detection (CAD) scheme, radiologists were able to improve their polyp detection rate and reduce the number of false positives in CT colonography, based on a study presented at the 2009 Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) annual conference in Chicago.
Organizations should act prior to the implementation of the new (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) HIPAA compliance guideline changes for 2010 and consistently monitor their facilities in order to make an easier transition and avoid the extended penalties that are now being proposed, said HIPAA privacy and security consult Grant Peterson during a Jan. 13 Webinar on the guidelines.