The Kaiser Family Foundation—in collaboration with CHIR experts Kevin Lucia and Katie Keith—has released a new report exploring factors leading to medical debt among people with insurance. Kevin Lucia has this preview.
2014 brings sweeping new health insurance protections for consumers, but for those reforms to be realized state insurance regulators need to make sure health plans comply with the law. A recent report released by the NAIC consumer representatives details best practices and provides recommendations to states to improve enforcement and better protect consumers. Sabrina Corlette has this overview.
On the eve of the December 23 deadline to sign up for health insurance coverage, the Administration announced that people whose previous health plans had been cancelled will now be allowed to enroll in alternative, bare-bones coverage. Consumers and those charged with helping them enroll – navigators, brokers, application assisters and others – are likely to have questions about the change. Sabrina Corlette provides answers here.
Last week the Administration announced plans to extend the Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plans (PCIPs) into 2014 to help ensure enrollees don’t face a gap in coverage. Recently CHIR released a set of frequently asked questions about transitioning out of high risk pool coverage and CHIR’s JoAnn Volk provides an update here.
Now that healthcare.gov is finally working, attention is turning to challenges people might face as they start seeking health care services. In his latest blog, Georgetown University Health Policy Institute’s Jack Hoadley discusses how Medicare officials responded to post-enrollment glitches in Part D – and provides some lessons learned for the ACA roll out.
Did the President tell the truth when he told the American people: “If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor”? Are health plans narrowing their provider networks and if so, what does it mean for consumers and the state officials charged with protecting them? CHIR experts Sabrina Corlette and Sally McCarty tackle these thorny issues in their latest blog.
Connecting people with health coverage is a complicated process, and the last few weeks have demonstrated how challenging it can be. But helping people maintain that coverage may be even more challenging. In this blog, Tricia Brooks of Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families discusses how policies relating to premium collection can have a critical impact on families’ ability to stay covered.
Millions of college students traveled home last week for Thanksgiving and it’s likely the Affordable Care Act came up for discussion at the dinner table, perhaps with mom’s prodding. CHIR’s JoAnn Volk covers some common questions that students and young adults may have about their coverage options.
The Thanksgiving weekend brought news for health care consumers to be thankful for. Healthcare.gov successfully handled 2 million visitors in 2 days. And the New York Times reported further good news about health care costs. Elissa Dines takes a closer look.
The Basic Health Program was included in the Affordable Care Act to provide states with an alternative coverage option for low-income adults. The Obama Administration recently proposed rules to govern the program. Our colleague Sonya Schwartz at Georgetown’s Center for Children for Children and Families suggests a few improvements to make the program more effective for consumers.
The opinions expressed here are solely those of the individual blog post authors and do not represent the views of Georgetown University, the Center on Health Insurance Reforms, any organization that the author is affiliated with, or the opinions of any other author who publishes on this blog.
