The Kaiser Family Foundation held a live interactive webcast on December 7, 2011, to discuss trends in state health care expenditures and the implications for national and state efforts to constrain health care costs.

The webcast examines new state-by-state estimates of public and private health spending from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) published in the online journal, Medicare and Medicaid Research Review. An expert panel offers perspectives on the trends within and across states, as well as the outlook for policy efforts to control costs, including provisions of the Affordable Care Act and various state initiatives.

The webcast features study lead author Gigi Cuckler, an economist with the CMS Office of the Actuary; John F. Holahan, director of the Health Policy Research Center at The Urban Institute; and Dan Crippen, executive director of the National Governors Association. Larry Levitt, a Foundation senior vice president and co-executive director of the Kaiser Initiative on Health Reform and Private Insurance, moderates the discussion.

MATERIALS RELATED TO THE WEBCAST:

 CMS Journal Article: “Health Spending by State of Residence, 1991-2009,” Medicare & Medicaid Research Review. (.pdf)

View statehealthfacts.org data on total health spending by state of residence.

 Participant Bios (.pdf)

 Transcript (.pdf)