The venerable University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston will accept patients with traditional Texas Medicaid health insurance, and some patients in Medicaid managed care plans. Memorial Hermann, another large health system in Houston, will accept traditional Medicaid patients and also those in Medicaid managed care plans. Neither institution will accept the Blue Cross Blue Shield HMO silver plan sold on the Affordable Care marketplace, according to NPR , and as clearly outlined on the MD Anderson website . As it turns out, the conservative state of Texas is able to obtain best in the world health care for its poorest and sickest citizens, while the private market representative, Blue Cross Blue Shield in this case, is barring its �customers� from the best and most popular Houston hospitals, including the public system (!), and all the doctors that go with these hospitals. This situation is hardly unique to the Lone Star state. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) is mandating t...
Escher - Relativity, 1953 The public comments for the proposed rules for Meaningful Use Stage 2 are closing now. After reading the public submissions of several organizations, I decided not to comment, since what I wanted to say was covered by much better heeled organizations, and I am not convinced that individuals can influence government in any shape or form nowadays. Instead, I thought that this would be a good time to look back at Meaningful Use Stage 1 and see if there are any lessons to be learned, something that CMS did not deem necessary to do before moving up the escalator to Stage 2. This is a bit peculiar considering that only 5% of physicians were able to attain Meaningful Use so far, and according to a new study published in Health Affairs , less than 14% of physicians said that their EHR has all the bells and whistles necessary for Meaningful Use Stage 1. Since Meaningful Use Stage 2 is largely an amplified version of Stage 1, it may be useful to look back and identify ...
"In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: " -- Genesis 15:18 Some four thousand years later, after numerous detours, major scope reductions, tragedies, compromises and constant upheaval, the Promised Land project is very much a messy work in progress. This is the nature of great promises, and in the here and now, we are contemplating yet another, albeit smaller, promise : � �Hospitals, physicians and other health care providers are clearly taking advantage of recent incentives to embrace the promise of technology [emphasis added] ,� said John R. Lumpkin, MD, MPH, senior vice president at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. � The Promise of Technology, as you may have guessed, was not made to us by the Lord Almighty, but instead it seems to be a product of spontaneous creation with mysterious origins. A few years ago, before the incentives mentioned b...
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