Tag: consumers

New Guidance Clarifying Preventive Services under the Affordable Care Act

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The Affordable Care Act requires most health plans to cover preventive services without cost sharing and enables consumers to access evidence-based medical care such as cancer screenings and immunizations for children. Implementation of this requirement, however, has raised questions and caused confusion among insurers, providers and consumers. Sandy Ahn reviews the Administration’s most recent guidance on this critical ACA provision, designed to clarify for insurers what they must do to comply and ensure that consumers receive the benefits they are promised under the law.

New Survey of Physicians Finds ACA Did Not Result in Influx of New Patients

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A new report from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Athenahealth finds that the newly insured under the Affordable Care Act did not result in an influx of new patients for physicians. Current medical student and guest blogger Mason Weber summarizes the main findings of the report, which surveyed approximately 16,000 physicians. He also offers his own perspective as a physician-to-be about the lack of discourse on a physicians’ ability to provide care effectively within the larger healthcare reform debate.

Some Changes in Store for 2016 Health Plans that Affect Consumers

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While open enrollment for 2015 has ended, insurers and marketplaces alike are gearing up for 2016 with federal guidance outlined under the 2016 Letter to Issuers and 2016 Benefits and Payment Parameters Final Rule. Sandy Ahn summarizes some of the changes in store for 2016 health plans that affect consumers.

Health Savings Accounts: Understanding the Basics

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There are various routes to getting health insurance coverage for you and your family. One possible option is to have a health savings account (HSA), which must be paired with a high-deductible health plan. In today’s post, Sandy Ahn goes over the basics of a HSA and some things to consider when looking at this option.

Embedded Deductibles: Source of Consumer Confusion

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Understanding how health insurance works can be confusing, particularly when it comes to deductibles, a topic we’ve had a lot of questions about. In today’s post, Sandy Ahn discusses how an embedded deductible works in a health plan for family coverage and compares that to an aggregate deductible. This information is also included in our online Navigator Resource Guide released last month.

State-Based Marketplaces Offer More Health Plan Choices for 2015 Coverage

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One of the goals of the Affordable Care Act is to make health insurance more affordable and accessible, in part by increasing health plan competition. In their latest blog post for the Commonwealth Fund, CHIR faculty Sean Miskell, Kevin Lucia and Justin Giovannelli find that competition is in fact increasing, and consumers shopping on the state-based marketplaces have more choices among insurers than they did last year.

Question on Stand-alone Dental Plans and Upcoming Open Enrollment

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With the change in weather, we’re beginning to field questions related to the upcoming 2015 Open Enrollment period as part of our technical assistance work funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. We recently received a question about the consequences of not paying premiums for stand-alone dental plans (SADP) in federally based Marketplaces. Sandy Ahn provides a summary on this issue.

Summing Up Questions from Navigators: A Grab Bag of Consumer Queries

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Though open enrollment into the new health insurance marketplaces is a distant memory and folks are gearing up for round 2 later this year, consumers continue to turn to Navigators and other assisters with questions. JoAnn Volk shares – and provides answers to – a selection of questions we’ve been getting from the field.

Back in the Day – Lessons from Pre-reform Days: Death to the Death Spirals

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While we’re struggling with Affordable Care Act (ACA) issues, there’s value in taking the time to look back and appreciate the impact of the ACA and other healthcare reforms implemented over the past few decades. To that end, CHIR faculty member and former Indiana Insurance Commissioner Sally McCarty is posting a series called “Back in the Day – Lessons from Pre-reform Days.” This installment looks at policies in a “death spiral.”

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.