The real test of so-called narrow network health plans will come not with Obamacare's exchanges, but with employers, who control a far bigger slice of the health benefits pie and have been highly reluctant to limit their workers' choice of hospitals and doctors.
While Indiana’s governor, legislature and life sciences executives are united behind the proposed Indiana Biosciences Research Institute, the state of Michigan has a cautionary tale to tell about such an effort.
Patients who got Erbitux together with chemotherapy as a first-line treatment lived about four months longer than those who got Avastin with chemotherapy, according to the 592-person study.
The 65,000-square-foot nursing-home and assisted-living facility would feature an Internet cafe, movie theaters and restaurant-style dining with an on-site chef.
Indianapolis-area hospitals are undergoing such profound and permanent changes that some predict, eventually the four major hospital systems will merge and shrink down to two.
Aggressive construction wiped out historical territories, thus opening the door to insurers playing hospitals off each other.
Health insurer WellPoint Inc. has named Lewis Hay III to its board of directors after announcing earlier this month that three members had resigned for personal reasons.
One month into Joe Swedish's tenure as CEO of WellPoint Inc., he and the communications staff set up an interview with me. That was quite different from my experience with Angela Braly, who declined all of my interview requests in her 63 months as CEO.
Three years ago, the physician practice American Health Network was concerned that the boom in employer on-site clinics would hurt its business. So it launched a program aimed at managing the health of employers’ workers. And it has come up with some impressive results.
The Supreme Court will not disturb a lower court ruling that blocks Indiana's effort to strip Medicaid funds from Planned Parenthood because the organization performs abortions.
Welcome to The Dose, a blog about the business of health care. As your host, J.K. Wall, I'll be writing about the most interesting new developments I see at hospitals, doctors, insurers, employers, patients, drugmakers, device companies and medical researchers around Indianapolis and around the country.
In the first post on my new blog, The Dose, I explain why the recently released Medicare charge data are meaningless for everyone but uninsured patients.
California residents who choose to buy health insurance through the state exchange being created by the Affordable Care Act may end up paying higher premiums.
Joe Swedish, a career hospital executive, is now two months into his job at the helm of Indianapolis-based WellPoint, the nation’s second-largest health insurer. In his first interview since starting work, Swedish indicated he’s taking his time to learn the people and the culture of the vast organization he now leads.
With premiums for health insurance likely to head north next year as President Obama’s health care reform law fully takes effect, both individuals and employers will pay for more health care out of their own funds and buy less insurance.
The study results, which will be released Monday afternoon, are part of Indianapolis-based Lilly’s campaign to get Medicare to pay for use of its brain imaging agent Amyvid.
