Health Insurance
Have Health Plans Abandoned Rare Disease Patients?: Season 3 | Episode 19
On this episode of the podcast, Terry and Bob discuss health access challenges facing patients with rare diseases on employer health plans. They point out new data on drug rebates showing no relationship between the size of rebates and drug price savings. And they...
Season 3 | Episode 12: $1 Prescriptions: The Future of Health Insurance
On this episode of the podcast, Terry and Bob discuss Health Plan Heroes, a new initiative by Patients Rising to identify employers who are expanding access to care while lowering costs for patients – without destroying their profitability in the process. It's no...
S3 | E6 Making Sense of California’s Healthcare News
Season 3 | Episode 6: Making Sense of California's Healthcare News On this episode of the podcast, Terry and Bob discuss the bid for universal healthcare in California. They also talk about the latest health policy developments at the federal level, including...
S2 | E47: How to Design Better Health Insurance
On this special holiday edition of the podcast, Terry discusses opportunities to improve employer health insurance, which provides most Americans with their health coverage. She discusses its rapidly increasing cost and access barriers -- especially for those with...
Patients Rising Supports Introduction of Help Act
HELP Act First Step to Patient-Centric Health Insurance Design WASHINGTON — Patients Rising Executive Director Terry Wilcox today released the following statement applauding the introduction of the bipartisan Help Ensure Lower Patient (HELP) Copays Act by U.S....
Coverage for Preventive Care Is a High-Value Insurance Design
By Surabhi Dangi-Garimella, Ph.D. For more than a decade now, health plans have been modeling their benefit structure to encourage enrollees to use certain “high-value” services—whose clinical benefits supersede the cost—and discourage the use of “low value” services,...
Census Results Show Uninsured Rate in the Pandemic Year Held Steady
By Surabhi Dangi-Garimella, Ph.D. According to data released by the U.S. Census Bureau, the COVID-19 pandemic, surprisingly, did not have a huge impact on the uninsured rate in the country. The year 2020 saw only a 0.1% increase in the number of uninsured individuals...
S2 | E32: Rising Cost of Health Insurance
On this episode of the podcast, Terry and Bob discuss the rising cost of health insurance, including premiums, deductibles, and copays. They point out how these higher costs disproportionately impact patients with rare and chronic diseases. They explain how insurance...
Season 2 | Episode 11: Guide to Disability Claims
On this episode of the podcast, Terry and Bob discuss the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), which protects employer-sponsored insurance plans from state regulations that help patients. They also detail the recently-passed $1.9 trillion stimulus...
Hospital Acquisition of Physician Practices: FTC to Reevaluate Impact on Marketplace Competition
By Surabhi Dangi-Garimella, Ph.D. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced that it has ordered 6 insurance companies to file a special report with the FTC by April 20, 2021, that will help the Commission analyze the impact of physician and healthcare facility...
For Those Struggling With Medical Debt, These Policy Solutions Can Help
Medical debt is not a new problem in the U.S. It has, however, received greater attention in recent years especially following implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA)—the premise of the ACA is to provide coverage to as many individuals as possible to spread...
The Ground Reality of Revoking the Affordable Care Act
Why are we talking about this? Because after the individual mandate installed by the Affordable Care Act (ACA)—which required a majority of Americans to enroll in some form of health insurance or pay a fine—was eliminated in 2017, senators and some states have been...