Health Care Reform News – May 19, 2010

Insurance 

Report: 2-Million Person Increase in Health Savings Account Enrollment; America’s Health Insurance Plans – May 2010 

A new AHIP report shows a 2-million person increase in Health Savings Account enrollment. Most notable: the increase largely comes from employer-based plan that have generally been a smaller player in this arena. Why the boom? Because of the economic downturn-HSAs are a generally a whole lot cheaper for employers and often for employees, particularly younger workers with lower health costs.

Transparency/Safety 

Florida Hospitals Take Aim at Infections; The Miami Herald – May 19, 2010 

Florida hospitals and surgeons have kicked off a new effort to find and prevent system problems that cause needless complications from surgery. The $800,000 program will try to find even simple errors that cause patients to develop infections and other problems that keep them in the hospital longer or force them to return with relapses. 

Academic Hospitals Team Up to Stop Catheter-Related Infections ; HealthLeaders Media – May 19, 2010

With Medicare threatening to reduce payments for hospital-acquired conditions, a consortium of academic medical centers is ramping up the effort to track and stop catheter-related bloodstream infections, a growing acute care concern. University HealthSystem Consortium, an alliance of 107 academic medical centers with 234 affiliated hospitals in the U.S., wants to reduce the number of catheter-related bloodstream infections, or CRBSIs, by streamlining systems of care and hospital practice cultures that cause them.

Wellness/Chronic Care 

The Battle Over Taxing Soda; The New York Times – May 19, 2010 

Sugary drinks cost much less than they used to and Americans drink more of them, raising costs for society as it copes with the obesity epidemic. 

State news 

AZ: State OKs Sales Tax Increase to Balance Budget; AP/Google News – May 19, 2010 

Arizona voters have approved a temporary sales tax increase designed to help the state avoid hundreds of millions of dollars in spending cuts to schools, health care and law enforcement.

FL: Miami-Dade Adds Tools for Possible Takeover of Jackson Health System; Miami Herald – May 19, 2010

Miami-Dade commissioners took a step toward removing the current Public Health Trust on Tuesday, approving a measure that allows them to sweep away the hospital’s governing board and replace it with a new seven-person panel if Jackson Health System’s finances worsen.

MA: Senate Approves Bill to Contain Health Costs; AP/Google News – May 18, 2010 

Wealthier hospitals would be required to make a one-time $100 million contribution to ease insurance premiums for smaller businesses under a bill approved Tuesday by the state Senate.

MN: Twin Cities Nurses Take Strike Vote on 14 Hospitals; The Minneapolis Star-Tribune – May 19, 2010 

Thousands of Minneapolis-St. Paul nurses from 14 hospitals are voting on whether to strike over a contract dispute centered on staffing levels and their pension plan. The voting by the 12,000 Twin Cities nurses will take place today. 

OK: House Overrides Health Care Bill Veto; Businessweek – May 19, 2010

The Oklahoma House has overridden Gov. Brad Henry’s veto of legislation to allow Oklahomans to opt out of a new federal health care overhaul law.

Medicare/Medicaid 

AMA Opposes ‘Doc Fix’ in Tax Legislation; The Hill – May 19, 2010 

The American Medical Association is opposing the Medicare “doc fix” included in the tax extenders bill House Democrats are preparing.

Four New Board Reps Named to MedPAC ; HealthLeaders Media – May 19, 2010 

Four new members have been appointed and two members reappointed to the 17-member Medicare Payment Advisory Commission: Scott Armstrong (president and CEO of Group Health Cooperative); Katherine Baicker, Ph.D. (professor of health economics in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard School of Public Health); Mary Naylor, Ph.D., R.N. (Marian S. Ware Professor in Gerontology and director of the New Courtland Center for Transitions and Health at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing); and Cori Uccello, a senior health fellow of the American Academy of Actuaries.

Implementing the Legislation 

Talk of the Nation: How The Health Care Law Affects You; NPR – May 18, 2010 

Kaiser Health News staff writer Mary Agnes Carey and The Wall Street Journal’s Janet Adamy discussed the many ways the health overhaul law will affect health care consumers young and old, and especially people with Medicare coverage on NPR’s Talk of the Nation.

Employers 

WSU Survey: Health Care Reform May Cause Decrease in Coverage; The Seattle Business Journal - May 17, 2010

About a third of Seattle-area executives said it may be cheaper for their businesses to stop offering health care benefits and pay fines in the wake of national health care reforms enacted earlier this year, a Washington State University survey discovered. 

Health Information Technology

Are Electronic Health Records Distracting to Your Doctor?; The Columbus Dispatch – May 19, 2010 

A new study finds that electronic medical records can both help and hinder doctor-patient relationships. 

Miscellaneous

Moody’s Predicts More Bad News For Nonprofit Hospitals; HealthLeaders Media – May 19, 2010

Non-profit hospital chiefs who think they’ve been dragged through the wringer with the credit crunch and the recession should not think the worst is over, according to a new Moody’s Investor Service report, which could be summed up in short: Brace yourselves for more bad news and changes for many years ahead.

Tough Medicine; The Minneapolis Star-Tribune – May 19, 2010

Nursing, once a job for life, runs headlong into wrenching changes in the hospital industry.

Zipnosis: Online Medicine in a Hurry; The Minneapolis Star-Tribune – May 19, 2010 

MinuteClinic entrepreneur Rick Krieger’s new venture, Zipnosis, lets patients get diagnoses online, for $25. The company started a pilot program at Park Nicollet this month.  

Chicago Readies Health Care High School; The Chicago Business Journal - May 19, 2010

In the fall, Chicago will open its first charter high school specializing in health care, a move local hospitals hope will help relieve chronic workforce shortages. Juniors and seniors will be able to earn credits by shadowing hospital workers and interning as assistant nurses and in other professions. 

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WellPoint CEO Is Grilled

The Wall Street Journal
May 19, 2010

Pressure is mounting on WellPoint Inc. Chief Executive Angela Braly, who faced tough questions about the health insurer’s practices at its annual shareholders meeting Tuesday, before the gathering ended abruptly after a director collapsed.

Ms. Braly is trying to quell concerns about her company’s highly public feud with the Obama administration over its pricing practices and allegations, which Wellpoint disputes, that the company drops coverage for women with breast cancer .

The feud came to a head May 9 when Ms. Braly sent a sharply worded letter to President Barack Obama chastising him for attacks on the health-insurance industry. Over the ensuing week, Ms. Braly has been navigating a public-relations crisis, battling fresh worries from investors, employees and brokers.

The sudden finish of Tuesday’s annual meeting came during a question-and-answer session after most of the meeting’s business was done. It followed the collapse of William H.T. Bush, a WellPoint director and the brother of former President George H.W. Bush. Mr. Bush was sent to an Indianapolis-area hospital, where he is “stable, alert and being evaluated,” according to WellPoint spokeswoman Kristin Binns.

One of the session’s first questions came from Arlene Zarembka, who owns a small law firm in St. Louis, and asked the company to explain a 41% rate increase the company originally said she would face, but which she says it later reduced to a 28% increase. She said she asked Ms. Braly, “What are you doing about these high rates of increase and how are you making sure what happened to me won’t happen to others?”

Ms. Braly answered the question by pressing her company’s broader message that it is merely passing on rising costs from other parts of the health-care system. “The recently passed [health overhaul] legislation does little to address the underlying cost issue,” Ms. Braly said, according to a spokeswoman. She expressed concern that “these soaring costs would challenge affordability for many.”

That stance could continue to put WellPoint at odds with Democrats, however, since rising prices could undercut President Obama’s signature domestic initiative. The administration is keeping a close eye on premium increases to make sure insurers don’t use the new law as an excuse to raise prices, according to an administration official.

Rob Stone, who owns 15 WellPoint shares and proposed that WellPoint study how to convert to nonprofit status, called Tuesday’s meeting “tense.”

After the meeting ended, about 100 protesters gathered outside WellPoint’s Indianapolis headquarters. The Main Street Alliance, a group of small-business owners that includes Ms. Zarembka, called on Ms. Braly to end the company’s “public-relations death spiral.”

The insurance industry’s price increases have become a lightning rod for criticism since WellPoint planned to raise prices on individual policies in California by as much as 39%.

In April, WellPoint, the national’s largest health insurer by membership, withdrew its California rate increases after errors were discovered in its filings. The company is now scrutinizing its calculations to resubmit the filing to the state’s regulator.

Bill Ryan, one of WellPoint’s outside directors, reiterated his support for Ms. Braly, saying, “She is the perfect person to have in these difficult times.” He added that the board has pressed the company about whether it could have anticipated some of its challenges. “We didn’t expect the administration to come at us in such an aggressive style,” said Mr. Ryan

A week ago, President Obama said his administration had recently asked an insurer to stop systematically dropping coverage of women with breast cancer. The president didn’t name the insurer, but WellPoint has been fending off accusations that it targets such women.

Ms. Braly denied the allegations and shot back at Mr. Obama for spreading “false information.” Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has called on states to investigate WellPoint’s pricing practices. And last Thursday, the Senate Finance Committee asked Ms. Braly for a detailed account of how the errors occurred. Ms. Braly is frustrated by the flap with the administration, and is working to quiet fears and get back to running her company. “The goal is to have a positive relationship with the government at all times,” she said in an interview at her offices.

Last week, Ms. Braly met with the company’s managers in Brooklyn, N.Y., where several hundred gathered to ask questions and a few thousand tuned in to a television feed. There, she was grilled about the company’s reputation and why it was being singled out by the government.

A day later, Ms. Braly faced another round of questions from the company’s top brokers, who gathered for an annual meeting and pressed her on how it would repair relations with the administration. The same day, Ms. Braly dispatched her strategy lieutenant, Bradley Fluegel, to New York to handle queries from institutional investors.

WellPoint’s stock fell almost 10% on April 30, the day after the company disclosed mathematical errors in its California rate filing, and it hasn’t rebounded.

Jay Nogueira, vice president at one of the company’s top 10 shareholders, T. Rowe Price, said the stock won’t bounce back until investors were convinced that there isn’t another chapter in the hostility with the government. “These guys are not dealing well with the public limelight,” said Mr. Noguiera.

WellPoint and the administration are now trying to downplay the recent fracases. Ms. Sebelius gave a speech Friday about a mile from WellPoint’s headquarters, and said at a press conference that she will continue to keep the pressure on insurers and that WellPoint “has been a leader and a major player and we look forward to working with them.”

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