Paying for the cost of prisoner’s health care has been debated since 1774, when the British parliament pasted the Health of Prisoners Act.In the United States prisoners have a constitutional right to health care via the Eighth Amendment concerning cruel and unusual punishment.
As the result of a 2001 class action law suit (Plata v. Schwarzenegger) brought against the State of California over the quality of medical care in the state’s 33-prison system the California Prison Health Care Receivership was established to oversee the care. U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson appointed Clark Kelso as “receiver” to administer prison health care. For 2009 Kelso is demanding at least $8 billion to construct new facilities.Continue reading ‘Penal Health Care California Style’
In 2005, the latest data from the Center for Disease Control, approximately one-fifth of the U.S. population had made one or more ED visits within the past 12 months. From 1996 through 2006 the number of hospitals EDs decreased from 4,019 to 3,833, thus added to the annual number of visits per ED.
Under normal conditions, on average most patients would see a physician in less than an hour with 70% spending less than 4 hours at the ED. But what happens when a deepening of the swine flu (H1N1) forces additional school closings in the United States. According to the New York Daily News the wait for care at some hospital emergency rooms was growing dramatically - up to 10 hours in some places.
The cost of medications continues to skyrocket, so savvy consumers must use money-saving strategies.
It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but prices of prescription drugs have been escalating, adding to the already prohibitively high cost of health care. According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, prescription drug expenditures grew at double-digit rates during almost every year since 1980, accelerating to 14.1% in 1997. Senior citizens who depend on Medicare, which does not cover outpatient prescriptions, shell out the most. But even people whose health insurance pays for medications may find they have hefty co-payments or deductibles. The prescription drug costs of private insurers are rising even faster than the overall total costs, increasing 17.7% in 1997, after growing 22.1% in 1995 and 18.3% in 1996. Here are some tips to help you stretch your prescription-drug dollar: Continue reading ‘How to Save on the Cost of Medications’
According to Kaiser Foundation researcher Catherine Hoffman, Scd, “”Even in the mid-1990s, when the economy was booming, we saw the number of uninsured Americans grew by about a million a year. And that is because there was never any control over health costs. We just don’t have a solution.”
With economy of the United States having been identified as being in an economic crisis the world has officially been declared to be in a recession. The unemployment rate has jumped from about 4.7 percent last December, when the recession began, to 6.7 percent today. Economists estimated in a Kaiser Family Foundation report that each 1 percent gain in the unemployment rate adds 1 million people to the Medicaid and State Children’s Health Insurance Program.Continue reading ‘Making Drugs Available’
Published by admin September 30th, 2008 in News.Closed
You don’t expect to pay for something that was done wrong. Starting October 1, 2008 the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) have said they won’t either. The CMS will use its financial clout to improve patient safety and control costs by no longer paying for what are known as “Never Events”.Defined by several national quality measurement organizations, “never events” include surgical errors such as procedures performed on the wrong body part or on the wrong patient. In addition to wrong-site surgery and serious medication errors, “never events” also include a variety of other complications. Initially they started with 8 events but now have expanded the list to 11. Continue reading ‘Never Events and You’
Medical debt is the second most common reason why American’s file bankruptcy even those with insurance. A frightening statistic from the Federal General Accounting Office study reported that as many as 95 percent of all hospital bills include overcharges This could make for an interesting conversation during the cocktail hour at the American Hospital Association convention.
Hospitals will use the excuse that it is nearly impossible to keep up with the various billing programs of 40 to 50 different insurance companies and Medicare and Medicaid. All of these organizations have their own forms and codes for “who’s covered for what, under what circumstances” rules, and own billing and payment systems. “The medical billing system is complicated and confusing,” admits Rick H. Wade, senior vice president of the American Hospital Association, which represents most of the hospitals in the United States. On Dec. 27, 2002, he told a “Dateline NBC” investigative team, “Trying to understand all the code words and jargon can turn your brain into oatmeal.”
Many hospitals overprice procedures and supplies egregiously. “It’s not unusual to see supply items marked up sometimes as much as 1000 percent,” says Randall Marrs, owner of Medical Audit Recovery Services in Tulsa, Okla. “I’ve seen an oral swab billed for $55, when a package would cost you $2 at the drug store.” Saline solution, which is often billed as much as $75 per 1000 ml, costs the hospital no more than 35 to 40 cents, he adds. Those are details you may not notice if your hospital co-pay is a fixed amount. But if you have to pay a portion of the bill say 10% or 20% you’re paying part of those inflated costs.Continue reading ‘Medical debt is the second most common reason why Americans file bankruptcy’
Published by admin August 11th, 2008 in News.Closed
If you have a regular doctor, have you ever called his or her office after 5 pm or on Saturday or Sunday? The answering machine usually says, “If you think you have an emergency, go to your nearest emergency room.”
The message was clear. You are now faced with having to make the decision on what type of care is needed. Visits to emergency departments are staggering with close to 115 million patients treated during 2005. This represents a 26 percent increase in patients over the past decade compared to a 12.3 percent increase in the countries population. Continue reading ‘“If This Is An Emergency, Please Go To Your Nearest Emergency Room”’
CDC is collaborating with public health officials in many states, the Indian Health Service, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to investigate an ongoing multi-state outbreak of human Salmonella serotype Saintpaul infections. An epidemiologic investigation comparing foods eaten by ill and well persons has identified consumption of raw tomatoes as the likely source of the illnesses. The specific type and source of tomatoes is under investigation; however, the data suggest that illnesses are linked to consumption raw red plum, red Roma, and round red tomatoes, and products containing these raw tomatoes.Continue reading ‘Investigation of Outbreak of Infections Caused by Salmonella Saintpaul’
Search
About
You are currently browsing the CrisisID weblog archives for the News category.
Longer entries are truncated. Click the headline of an entry to read it in its entirety.
