State Variation and Health Reform: A Chartbook October 31, 2009 Report This chartbook pulls together data related to state variation in key areas such as major industry types, poverty and unemployment rates and fiscal conditions; health coverage and the uninsured; Medicaid and CHIP eligibility and enrollment; Medicaid spending and financing; access to Health Care; health care costs; and insurance markets.
Pulling it Together: The “Third School” for Controlling Health Care Costs? October 26, 2009 Perspective For as long as I have been in the field, there have been two dominant schools of thought about how to control health care costs. One school, The Regulators, believed that the best way to slow increasing costs was to control the total resources going into the health care system:…
Pulling it Together: Implementation October 7, 2009 Perspective When I was a graduate student at MIT my adviser Jeffrey Pressman was a great political scientist who had just written the seminal book on program implementation. It was called, simply enough, Implementation, with a subhead that read: “how great expectations in Washington are dashed” (OK, we political scientists study…
Rural Health: Laying the Foundation for Health Reform October 2, 2009 Event The Alliance for Health Reform and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation co-sponsored this briefing to have a panel of experts answer questions about how some aspects of pending health reform proposals may have a substantial impact on rural care. What provisions in the various reform proposals affect rural health care?…
Medicaid and State Budgets: From Crunch to Cliff October 1, 2009 Fact Sheet This fact sheet discusses the status of Medicaid and state budgets in light of the continuing recession and the federal fiscal relief provided to state Medicaid programs through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). The ARRA money has proved to be critical in helping states address budget shortfalls, preserve…
Today’s Topics In Health Disparities: Is the Health Care System Ready for Health Reform? October 1, 2009 Event On Wednesday, November 4, at 1 p.m. ET, this Today’s Topics In Health Disparities live webcast examined how ready the health care system is for the influx of newly covered individuals that health reform aims to deliver. In the health care proposals being considered by Congress, changes to Medicaid alone…
Public Opinion on Health Reform: What Do the Polls Mean? October 1, 2009 Event The Alliance for Health Reform and the Kaiser Family Foundation co-sponsored this briefing to have a panel of experts answer questions about how public support for health reform waxes and wanes depending, not only on what’s being proposed in the reform proposals, but also on who asks the question and…
The Sleeper in Health Reform: Long-Term Care and the CLASS Act October 1, 2009 Event The Kaiser Family Foundation briefing examines a little-noticed but major provision in two leading health reform bills that would change the way that the U.S. pays for long-term care. The provision, known as the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) Act, would establish a national voluntary insurance program that…
The Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) Act October 1, 2009 Issue Brief This issue brief provides a brief overview of the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) Act, including a discussion of how the program would be financed and whom it is intended to reach. The paper was released as part of a Kaiser briefing about the act, a component of…
Explaining Health Care Reform: What is Comparative Effectiveness Research? September 29, 2009 Issue Brief The brief examines current funding for comparative effectiveness research, the provisions included in the current health reform legislation, and issues related to which treatments that might be studied, whether and how to weigh costs of care, and how such findings will be used and shared with health-care practitioners and the…