Insurers news and information

Consumer prices for hospital services dropped 0.7% in April, the largest one-month decline since the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics first reported the figures in January 1997. The drop follows a 0.4% increase the prior month, figures for the BLS Consumer Price Index show. In April 2012, hospital...
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The percentage of employers with grandfathered healthcare plans continues to dwindle, according to a survey released Thursday.
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When Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, told HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that he worried Obamacare’s implementation was headed for a “train wreck,” she publicly promised to bring him into the loop.
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Phoebe Putney Health System, which has gone to the Supreme Court and back in its quest to buy a rival hospital, lost a key legal battle when a judge imposed a restraining order on the union.
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If HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was calling health execs seeking donations, she didn't ask some of the largest not-for-profit hospital systems or their national trade group. She didn't need to.
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Patients in western and southern Maine will lose access to local doctors and hospitals under a “backroom deal” between MaineHealth and the state's largest health insurer, according to an executive at another health system excluded from the arrangement.
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Former President Bill Clinton may be the headliner at the May 18-22 American Psychiatric Association convention in San Francisco, but the release of the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, known as DSM-5, will steal the show.
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Some hospitals have been using low-dose CT scans in recent years to screen patients at high risk for lung cancer even though most payers, including the CMS, still don't reimburse for the tests.
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A for-profit company that owns three hospitals in New Jersey unveiled a new identity as an integrated health system with plans to offer a Medicaid plan and sell insurance on the state exchange about to launch under the healthcare reform law.
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Individuals who act as navigators assisting consumers in applying for health coverage through state insurance exchanges should have extensive training and exam-based certification, the trade association for brokers and agents has told the CMS.
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