What to Read on Implementation of the Affordable Care Act
More Solid Proof That Obamacare Is Working -- Rick Ungar
The provision of the law that permits young adults under 26...to remain on their parents' health insurance program resulted in at least 600,000 newly insured Americans during the first quarter of 2011....every one of the young immortals we add to the rolls of the insured is one less young adult who will turn to the emergency room to fix a broken leg and then find themselves unable to pay the bill -- leaving it to the rest of us to pay the tab.Soma No PrescriptionBuy Cymbalta onlineBecause the under 26 crowd tends not to get sick, adding them to the insurance pools helps bring the very balance that was intended by the new law. The more healthy people available to pay for those in the pool who are ill (translation: the older people), the better the system works and the lower our premium charges should go.[And] there has been a significant uptick in small businesses taking advantage of the tax benefits offered by the ACA to provide health insurance to employees where they previously did not do so.
Do Pay-for-Performance Health Programs Really Work? -- Jake Marcus
Earlier this month, Medicare finalized the rules of a new program -- mandated by the Affordable Care Act -- that will pay hospitals based on the quality, not just the quantity, of care they provide.In general, there are two ways to reward healthcare providers: 1) based on the health outcomes of patients or 2) based on how closely hospitals adhere to recommended processes of care.Medicare has started relatively small by choosing to redistribute only 1 percent of reimbursements, so it will have the chance to evaluate the effects of a promising program without it having disastrous consequences if it fails.