Category: CMS

UnitedHealthcare Community Plan of Pennsylvania has launched two new text-messaging services that help people enrolled in Medicaid benefit plans take charge of their health and well-being. UnitedHealthcare Community Plan of Pennsylvania has launched two new text-messaging services that help people enrolled in Medicaid benefit plans take charge of their health and well-being. read more …read…

The leaders of Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield’s Medicaid business are hailing Governor Mike Pence’s proposal to enhance the state’s Healthy Indiana Plan (HIP). …read more    

Today’s headlines include reports about the Indiana governor’s alternative plan to expand Medicaid. Kaiser Health News staff writer Sarah Varney, working in collaboration with PBS Newshour, reports: “Men and women involved in the criminal justice system are more likely to be sicker than the general population, with higher rates of diabetes, hypertension, depression, mood disorders…

The governor’s lawyers filed an appeal Wednesday arguing that the lawmakers who filed the initial lawsuit an appeals court ruling did not have standing to post the challenge. …read more    

A study of Medicare beneficiaries with a history of heavy smoking found that new lung cancer screening guidelines would likely double the proportion of lung cancers found at an early stage, but at a steep cost of more than $9 billion over five years. …read more    

I was on a call recently with someone who started to state that it was inevitable that the payers would start requiring doctors be meaningful users of a certified EHR. I wouldn’t say that it’s 100% sure that payers won’t adopt meaningful use, but I think it’s far from a forgone conclusion that they’ll jump…

A federal task force on Tuesday charged 90 people, including 16 doctors, with generating $260 million of false Medicare billings following raids in cities across the country. …read more    

Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), considered a likely presidential candidate in 2016, on Tuesday called for structural changes to Social Security and Medicare as a way to control spending for both programs, which are growing steadily as the U.S. population ages. …read more    

Consultant Avalere Health found enrollment growth even in states that opted not to expand the health insurance program for the poor because of the so-called “woodwork effect.” …read more    

Various groups see telemedicine as a potential boon for people with complex chronic diseases who have difficulty getting to the doctor. But there are hurdles from Medicare payment rules to state licensing restrictions. …read more