The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published its Current Year (CY) 2026 Physician Fee Schedule (PFS) and related policy updates on November 5. While the final rule spans a wide range of Medicare payment and operational policies, the information collection request associated with the Medicare Prescription Drug Inflation Rebate Program introduces a particularly … Continue reading
Tag Archives: Healthcare
Impact of AI on Healthcare
Executive Summary Introduction Artificial intelligence (AI) has had a large impact on healthcare by streamlining clinical workflows as well as medical research. Unlike many consumer-facing AI models such as ChatGPT, medical AI solutions are designed to assist with specific purposes such as electronic health record (EHR) documentation, radiological image analysis, and protein structure prediction. A … Continue reading
AI Regulation Updates in the Healthcare Sector
Introduction As Artificial Intelligence (AI) expands into different sectors of United States society, deciding how to regulate AI while still allowing innovation is a pressing problem. In the healthcare sector, there have been multiple lawsuits regarding the use of AI. These span both the insurance and care provider industries, with concerns of bias in AI … Continue reading
Gear Up: A Comparison of Durable Medical Equipment in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom
Executive Summary: Introduction: Following recent legislation and proposed regulations that look to reduce Medicare or other state-funded spending to that of other similarly situated countries, these reforms may overlook the key differences of the drivers of each nation’s individual health care marketplace. While – international comparisons can sometimes be helpful, comparing the price, reimbursement, and … Continue reading
Housing as Healthcare: Medicaid’s New Program Sparks Debate
Executive Summary: Introduction: On November 16th, 2023, The Biden Administration released a press statement in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announcing the Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) Health-Related Social Needs (HRSN) Framework, a framework that sets up states to use appropriate interventions to support housing efforts for certain Medicaid … Continue reading
We Were Born to Die: STI Rates’ Exponential Increase in the U.S.
Executive Summary Introduction The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have alerted an increasing STI epidemic with a reported 2.5 million cases in 2022. In response to cases rising, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has launched an STI initiative. One of the STIs experiencing the more drastic growth in cases is … Continue reading
ICHRAs: An Alternative to Traditional Employer-Sponsored Coverage
Executive Summary Introduction On average, employer premium costs for traditional group plans have increased by 5-7% annually. In response, in 2019, the Trump Administration published a final rule to expand the use of health reimbursement arrangements (HRAs) to provide employers more flexibility in providing health coverage. Since January 1, 2020, employers of any size can offer … Continue reading
Retail Health Clinics: What are they? Who are they for?
Sometimes it may feel like there are very few things everyone can agree on – but one universal truth is that healthcare in the United States is unique and constantly evolving. The system has a dynamic history of morphing delivery mechanisms to fit the capabilities and needs of a changing population, from the emergence of … Continue reading
Chronic Disease and Our Food System
Introduction As recently reported by the CDC, the number of states with obesity rates of 35% or higher has almost doubled in the past two years. In 2018, 9 states reported having obesity rates above 35%. In 2020, that number rose to 16 states reporting obesity rates above 35% with Delaware, Iowa, Ohio, and Texas … Continue reading
Delayed Care Suggests Sicker Patients
Introduction The COVID-19 pandemic has shocked the healthcare system and changed the manner care is being supplied as well as demanded by patients. Over the past year, the United States has seen demand shifts for many health procedures as there is a widespread deferral of care, including patients missing recommended screenings as well as a … Continue reading
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