Crain's Detroit Business: Rates of unnecessary hospitalization highest in Detroit, Dearborn – study
Report on CHRT’s September 2010 “CHRTBook: Health Care Variation in Michigan.” (Free registration required)
Read more >Health Care Reform – The Six Month Mark
September 23, 2010 may well prove to be a particularly important day in the health care reform journey. On that day, six months after the Affordable Care Act was signed into law, several key provisions went into effect that were designed to help people see some immediate benefits in advance of the full blown implementation of the law starting in …
Read more >National Health Care Reforms Are Already Beginning
September 23, 2010 marks six months since our new national health care reform law, also known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), became effective. It remains a controversial undertaking for some, yet a positive step for others. The law’s implementation is a long and complex journey. Much of the spotlight has been on PPACA reforms that begin …
Read more >Actuarial Projections and the ACA: The Good News Story You Never Heard
This week, the esteemed journal Health Affairs published the latest findings from the office of the Chief Actuary of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), with new estimates on the cost impact of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). CMS actuaries are now projecting that annual growth in health spending for 2010-2019 will be 0.2 percent higher than projections …
Read more >Peer Reviewed or Not: A Reflection on How We Communicate About What Works (Blogging and All of That)
Labor Day ought to be a time to think and reflect on one’s work. This Labor Day I found myself thinking about this blog and the form of communication it represents. At the end of August, the New York Times ran an article about a change in the approach to publishing scholarly work in the humanities. The opening line of …
Read more >To scan or not to scan
There is an increasing consensus that many high tech radiology procedures are overused but no agreement on what to do about it. An important review study reported in the Archive of Internal Medicine concluded that exposure to even one CT scan can produce cancer later in life. The editorial in the Archive notes that every day more than 19,500 CT …
Read more >The Ann Arbor News: Will Ann Arbor hospitals meet electronic health records deadline?
This in-depth look at the status of electronic health record implementation among Ann Arbor area hospitals and physicians groups features comments from CHRT director Marianne Udow-Phillips.
Read more >Pain Should Be Getting Our Attention!
The Affordable Care Act was signed into law on March 23, 2010. As health care reform is implemented and the United States continues to devote extensive resources to health care; there are real opportunities to improve health care quality and equity by improving pain care. Specifically, pain research practice and policy can substantively inform the broader national health care policy …
Read more >The Fundamentals of Insurance Reform: A Reminder
On August 1, 2010, the U.S. District Court in Virginia ruled that the lawsuit against the Affordable Care Act (ACA) can proceed. Judge Hudson defined the issue as: “whether or not Congress has the power to regulate – and tax – a citizen’s decision not to participate in interstate commerce [by choosing not to buy health insurance.]” A summary judgment …
Read more >The Cost of Chronic Disease and What To Do About It
This past week, our Center released a report on the cost of chronic disease in Michigan. As we noted in that report, nationally, five percent of the U.S. population accounts for almost half of all health care spending and 20 percent accounts for 80 percent. In addition, according to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, chronic disease accounts …
Read more >