Payers news and information

A Medicare test of accountable care in Wisconsin slowed cost growth last year for about 20,000 seniors. That's good news, of course, to economists and policymakers. But for hospitals, the news was not all good because most payers continue to reimburse on a fee-for-service basis rewarding more...
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The Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association is the first insurer to receive a federal contract to offer individual insurance coverage options across a majority of state insurance exchanges in 2014.
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The U.S. government was on the brink of a partial shutdown Monday after the Democratic-led Senate refused to back down in a clash with the Republican-led House over President Barack Obama's landmark health law.
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In an era when the healthcare industry is no longer growing faster than the rest of the economy, it takes something special to rack up double-digit or better gains for five consecutive years. The 40 members of Modern Healthcare's 2013 class of Healthcare's Hottest met that criteria and more.
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What it does: Health Systems International provides medical cost-management services to healthcare payer organizations.
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Massachusetts finds itself in a unique position as states gear up to launch new insurance marketplaces under President Barack Obama's healthcare law.
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The Obama administration will allow Arkansas to move forward with a widely watched plan to expand Medicaid to cover an additional 200,000 residents by giving most of them premium assistance for plans in the state health insurance exchange.
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While these are very early days for the nation's new healthcare law, some Americans are already blaming it for higher premiums and few report much in the way of benefits so far.
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The nation's largest provider of security guards plans to discontinue its lowest-cost health plans and steer roughly 55,000 workers to new government-sponsored insurance exchanges for coverage.
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An HHS report on health plan premiums in states where the federal government is fully or partly running the new insurance exchanges finds premiums will be significantly lower than expected.
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