Maryland news and information

While a new report estimates millions of people could be added to Medicaid and CHIP if all states expanded the programs under the ACA, several states have refused, leaving thousands without coverage.
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Newly approved rates for health plans that will be sold in the individual market through Maryland's new health benefit exchange will have some of the lowest costs among the 12 states that have either proposed or approved rates, the state's insurance commissioner said Friday.
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With the anticipated arrival of some 14 million newly insured individuals into the nation's healthcare system in 2014, a major concern that remains is whether coverage will equal access. Texas lawmakers, physicians and nurse practitioners have taken a step forward on that problem while many other...
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One of the insurance industry's medical home experiments has slowed costs and significantly lifted quality scores in its second year of operation, raising hopes for pilot programs initiated under the 2010 healthcare reform legislation.
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The state suspended the medical licenses of three doctors at abortion clinics accused by state regulators of putting women's health at risk—including one case in which a woman died.
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With details for insurance exchanges still in the works, navigator organizations are starting to hire staff while also fending off concerns over conflicts of interest and the potential for fraud.
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Rhode Island policymakers and the state's healthcare industry began to draft plans last month on how best to overhaul payment to hospitals, doctors and other providers and simultaneously improve the health and well-being of its citizens.
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An ambitious plan to revamp Maryland's unusual system of setting hospital prices would create and enforce a cap on hospital spending growth. In so doing, the state may push providers to address the other driver of rising healthcare costs: how often and where medical care is delivered.
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Help for consumers who want to purchase health insurance plans through the new exchanges will be coming to Georgia this year in the form of paid “navigators” earning from $20 to $38 an hour.
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It's taken years for Dr. Ronald Sroka, a Crofton, Md., primary care physician, to hone his skill at prescribing what he considers the right medications. His patients' insurance companies may not agree. And in what's called “step therapy,” those insurers can also refuse to pay for drugs...
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