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With lawmakers under increasing pressure to reduce overall federal spending, funding has been limited in many areas of health research and enforcement. Even before the recent focus on deficit reduction, funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has been significantly constrained. In the 10 years prior to fiscal year 2008, the NIH budget grew by 31 percent, to $29 …

Well, the federal government has spoken about its intent with regard to defining essential benefits, and the answer is: leave it to the states. As Tim Jost notes in his latest blog post, there are some (probably, most) who assumed the Affordable Care Act would result in more uniformity in essential benefits across the country. But instead (no doubt bowing to …

OK, I admit it: we made a mistake. Earlier this year, we were asked if we had ever seen a one-page flow chart of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) from a consumer perspective. We hadn’t seen one—and after much looking, still didn’t—so we decided to create one ourselves. It seemed like such a simple idea. Hmmm—not so simple in the …

As we continue to focus on health care spending, it is important to look at the tools we’ve tried already and learn from our experience – especially our mistakes. In health care, it seems that every action taken to reduce spending leads to an equal and opposite reaction elsewhere in the system. This issue has been well illustrated by the …

Last spring when my colleagues and I were teaching a class on health insurance in America at the U-M Ford School of Public Policy, we asked our students to write their final papers on what they would change about the Affordable Care Act. Three of our earnest and committed students took on the task of trying to make the Community …

Many Americans have an almost visceral reaction against what is sometimes called “socialized medicine.” Socialized medicine is often discussed in the context of the British Health Service – where the government is both the payer and the employer of those delivering care. But the irony is, we have a superb example of a very similar approach here in America: the U.S. Department …

While there has been considerable attention of late focused on the Affordable Care Act and the courts, many states, health care providers, and employers are continuing to move forward on the assumption that the Affordable Care Act will stay in effect—at least in its broadest dimensions. While a Supreme Court decision is now expected by the end of the 2012 …

Many of those working to improve health care in America have advocated for the use of electronic prescribing as an important tool for improving patient safety and moderating health care cost trends. A recent report released by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) documents abuses in the Medicare drug benefit that underline the potential value of electronic prescribing tools. According to the …