Together with the Alliance for Health Reform, the Kaiser Family Foundation presented an April 26 briefing, ACA 101: What You Need to Know. Especially helpful to audiences with limited knowledge of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), this briefing is a useful review for anyone struggling to understand the complex changes scheduled to take effect in 2014.

An expert panel addressed these and other issues:

• Jennifer Tolbert, director of state health reform at the Kaiser Family Foundation, provided an overview of the provisions in the health law

• Michael Hash, director of the HHS Office of Health Reform, discussed the parts of the law that have been implemented to date, and what is coming in 2014 and beyond.

• Janet Trautwein, CEO of the National Association of Health Underwriters, addressed the requirements for employers in the law

• Sabrina Corlette, research professor and project director of the Center on Health Insurance Reforms at Georgetown University’s Health Policy Institute, outlined major insurance changes in the law, and discussed how the insurance marketplaces will work.

• Karen Milgate, a health policy consultant who is a veteran of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, which advises Congress on Medicare payment policy, explained delivery system reforms and cost containment provisions in the law.

Diane Rowland of the Kaiser Family Foundation and Ed Howard of the Alliance for Health Reform co-moderated.

This forum took place from 12:15 to 2:00 p.m. on Friday, April 26 at the Dirksen Senate Office Building, Room G50.

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