AHLRICHS: Turn health reform into pragmatic answers
Health reform entrepreneurship could brand Indiana as productive, healthy place for employers to operate.
Health Care Reform
Articles
Health reform tripping up Indiana wellness incentive
Federal health reform will trump an Indiana law that allows health insurers to offer steep discounts to employers with healthy workers and which institute aggressive wellness programs, but experts say other provisions will motivate small firms.
Study: Indianapolis high-priced hospital market
Indianapolis-area hospitals have negotiated reimbursement rates with private health insurers that are two and three times higher than those paid by the federal Medicare program, suggesting the hospitals have the upper hand over insurers, according to a new study.
Q&A
Les Zwirn, executive director of Better Healthcare for Indiana, talked about his group’s progress on promoting community collaborations to improve health and reduce the cost of care in cities around Indiana. BHI is hosting its third health care summit of Indiana community leaders today at Second Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis.
Nurse practitioners get some autonomy
Could nurse practitioners get a promotion in the medical field? At least one health insurer is treating them like doctors now.
Indiana health exchange may take page from Utah playbook
In Utah, employers can give each of their workers a specific amount of money to apply toward health insurance. The worker then can use that money to choose from the 66 plans in the health insurance exchange.
Q&A: Jim Hamilton
Jim Hamilton, an employee-benefits lawyer at Bose McKinney & Evans in Indianapolis, discussed the likelihood of a Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives changing or even outright repealing the health care reform law, formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
New estimate drops health plan’s cost to Indiana
A new estimate has lowered the expected cost of the federal health care overhaul to Indiana’s state government to perhaps $2.6 billion over the next decade.
WellPoint, other insurers’ stock buybacks concern investors
Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc. and competing U.S. health insurers approved $10 billion in stock repurchases in the past year, a concern to investors who say buybacks failed to increase share prices and who want more spent on dividends.
Health care reform boosts business for consultants
John Gause has grown the size of his benefits brokerage and consulting firm by more than half this year for one big reason: health care reform. He needs more hands on deck because his clients–employers–are facing a raft of new regulations with which they must comply.
Consultants: Pharma industry facing huge changes
To date, most analysts say health reform turned out pretty well for the pharmaceutical industry. But a detailed analysis by Deloitte Consulting says the indirect effects of reform will deliver a gut punch to the industry that will lead to full-scale transformation akin to what the telecommunications world has seen over the past three decades.
Insurers cautious on accountable care
Health insurers, including locally based WellPoint Inc. and Advantage Health Solutions, have been looking to work with health care providers to form accountable-care organizations. But they also worry that the accountable-care concept will become nothing more than a negotiating tactic by hospitals and doctors.
Drugmakers’ ‘doughnut hole’ deal to shave sales
Drugmakers including Pfizer Inc., AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. and Eli Lilly and Co. may provide more than $2 billion in drug discounts to senior citizens next year under a deal pharmaceutical companies made with the White House.
Reform will boost health care costs, Indianapolis panel predicts
Rising costs aren't the only impact of reform, say panelists taking part in a Power Breakfast sponsored by Indianapolis Business Journal.
Health reform forces providers, insurers to lay aside rivalries
In this new age of health care, ushered in by President Obama’s signing in March of a sweeping health care reform law, health care players are encouraged to remove the gloves if they want to reap the benefits of reform.
Rules mostly falling WellPoint’s way
Health insurers won fairly broad leeway under key rules suggested by state insurance commissioners that will govern what kinds of expenses count toward meeting a new federal threshold to spend at least 80 percent of premiums dollars on medical care.
VoCare raises $2.2 million for telehealth device
The local startup expects to raise another $1.3 million this year and launch pilots of a new mobile device connecting patients with doctors.
On-site health care clinics moving beyond traditional settings
Health clinics based in employers’ offices are showing signs of breaking out of their niche among blue collar and government employers—factories, warehouses and school corporations—and could pop up in Class A office buildings filled with white collar workers.
Barron’s: Brighter days ahead for WellPoint
It’s been a tough year for major health insurers, but Barron’s magazine predicts a big comeback for Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc. and its rival UnitedHealth Group.
After health reform, Lilly looking for more
The health reform debate may have ended in Congress, but Eli Lilly and Co. remains active, sponsoring a talk about the positives of the
bill—and calling for further government efforts to help pharmaceutical research and development.