Insurance coverage is nice but nothing beats free money.
At least, that's the apparent political thinking that has elevated new estimates on expected rebate checks to the marquee position whenever senior Democrats—including the president—have commented on the healthcare law in recent days.
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Apparently, Medicare fraudsters are working harder—and smarter—for the billions of dollars they pilfer every year from the massive federal healthcare program.
Federal officials told a Senate panel this week they see a trend away from the “lazy man's fraud” of charging Medicare for phantom durable medical equipment toward more complex scams involving home healthcare and other outpatient treatment.
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After a panel discussion at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington on Tuesday, obstetrician and Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn, a Republican, had some guidance for the nation's physicians.
"Go into concierge medicine," Coburn said, adding that this option will result in doctors "enjoying medicine better and they can do that with Medicare patients."
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It's unknown whether President Barack Obama's unusual call earlier this month for the Supreme Court to uphold the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act made much of an impact on the justices, but it appeared to fall flat for another important group.
Contrary to the president's exhortations in an April 3 speech to a gathering of news editors for the court to uphold the 2010 healthcare law, a plurality of voters, 49%-38%, want the court to strike it down, according to the latest Quinnipiac University poll released this morning. The telephone poll of 2,577 registered voters was taken April 11-17, the week after the president's widely covered address.
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House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) defended his budget plans for Medicaid in his panel's hearing Tuesday to examine the nation's safety net programs.
Ryan opened the hearing by noting that welfare reform in the mid-1990s established meaningful work requirements, set time limits, and gave states the ability to design effective programs. According to Ryan, poverty in female-headed households dropped to 39.3% in 2001 from 55.4% in 1991. He then put the nation's current debt troubles in context by saying that if a crisis hits, those in the safety net will be hit hardest.
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The thin hope of Republican congressional leaders that the Obama administration would hold off on issuing new regulations between November's election and the seating of the new Congress in January appears dead.
Speaker of the House John Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell wrote the president Wednesday over their concerns the administration would use the waning months of his first term to issue “midnight regulations” that leave Congress no opportunity to provide oversight.
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Recent news about a campaign to stop the distribution of infant formula samples at hospitals could present a good opportunity to improve patient-centered care, a favorite phrase that clinicians and provider groups use almost daily.
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In conjunction with “Workplace Wellness Week,” the U.S Chamber of Commerce has released a workplace wellness toolkit to encourage both small and medium-sized employers design and implement health promotion programs in their places of business.
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