Do you love coffee but also love red meat and dessert? If so, there’s good news and bad news. On Thursday, February 19, the Dietary Guideline Advisory Committee (DGAC) released a lengthy 571-page report of suggestions to the Department of Heath and Human Services (HHS) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). The report explained … Continue reading
The International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision (ICD-9) is nearly forty years old and doesn’t reflect modern medicine. It even lacks the capacity to cover new treatments and technology and fails to provide a significant level of detail in diagnoses, the nature and extent of a complication and specificity regarding how a complication is treated. … Continue reading
The rising cost of health benefits and prevalence of chronic diseases has increased the significance of employer wellness programs. These programs encourage healthier lifestyles and may help reduce health care costs, with numerous large firms suggesting that the programs save the average employer $3.27 for every dollar spent on them. The Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions … Continue reading
With the influx of insured patients skyrocketing due to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) as well as our growing and aging population, the demand for primary care physicians is at an all-time high. By 2020, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) has predicted that we will be in need of 20,400 more primary care … Continue reading
“I looked at that menu, and I just couldn’t control myself!” How many times have you walked into a restaurant planning to order a salad but instead got a whopping 2,000 calorie steak meal? We’ve all faced shortages of self-control, trading in short-term gain for long-term strain. Choosing the inferior food option is only one … Continue reading
When asked about how an industry is recovering from a recession, you would probably point to wages or the number of newly hired employees. Would you think to look at the number of hours employees are working? The average weekly hours across industries has varied widely since the Great Recession. Let’s first look at the … Continue reading
Since the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), everyone has been holding their breath in anticipation of seeing its effects. In an attempt to curb health care costs by diluting the risk pool, the ACA has mandated that individuals get insurance or pay a fine. It is true that millions are more insured due … Continue reading
Ever since the members of the U.S Business Roundtable presented their plan to gradually raise the retirement age to seventy last year, the political and economic realm has been on fire with both support and recrimination. This fervor has only intensified after a recently released report by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) which stated that, holding … Continue reading
This past Saturday (November 15, 2014) marked the beginning of the open enrollment period for 2015 Affordable Care Act plans. All indications are that this year’s enrollment period is functioning much smoother than last year’s, which is good for the administration. The national website has functioned much better than last year and a majority of … Continue reading
Jonathan Gruber is a prominent economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T). He was thrown into the national spotlight this week when a video of him speaking at an academic conference surfaced. The footage displays Gruber dealing judgments about the lack of transparency and voter ignorance that he and the Obama Administration took … Continue reading
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