Tag: Health reform

Recon takes an analytical look behind select developments in healthcare

An opinionated take on NEJM highlights for July 2017

Taking stock: two decades of progress in heart failure: Here comes a clever study using existing clinical trial data to assess progress in standard of care over time for heart failure. For each trial, the authors assessed the rate of sudden cardiac death during the early part of the study (excluding patients with ICDs), and it appears that between 1995 and 2014, it decreased by nearly half.  As always, in observational retrospective studies, one has to worry about systematic biases around the population that are included (i.e. are they really

Read More

Could a delay in the employer mandate be a boost to government run exchanges?

In 2011 we commented that while the health reform law, the ACA, had several positive intended consequences, it also could spawn several perverse effects and side-effects. Now in an attempt to ward off some of those unintended consequences, the administration has delayed the employer mandate from 2014 to 2015. Reactions range from praise (from the unlikely alliance of Democrats and business groups), derision (from Republicans and right leaning think tanks) and bemusement or befuddlement (across the spectrum). Of course, perturbing a portion of a complex system has ripple effects of

Read More

Emerging Unintended Consequences of Health Care Reform

In complex system, even small changes can have big, unexpected consequences.  These are occasionally beneficial but more often than not have a negative impact.     Over the last year we have started to see some evidence for unintended consequences from the health care reform act.  Negative impacts that we see are of two kinds: Perverse effects that directly affect the objectives of the act and side-effects that manifest in seemingly unrelated areas (see figure below). It is not the intent here to comment on the overall merits or demerits of

Read More

Rapid shift to “bare bones” coverage among Massachusetts small employers: preview of Federal reform impact?

Summary Massachusetts small group went from an average actuarial value (share of expected medical costs covered by the benefit) of 85% in Q1-07 to 73% in Q4-09. In the same timeframe, actuarial benefit levels in another state for which we could find data (Wisconsin) held steady. Given that this trend was well underway in 2007/08, only a portion of the change can be attributed to the economy. The rest may well be a result of 2006 Massachusetts healthcare reform. If true, back-of-the-envelope analysis suggests 50-70% of the decline in actuarial

Read More

Health care reform not so easy to derail

Prediction 1: Despite all the beating of drums we do not think there will be any major legislative changes between now and 2012. controlling the house but not the senate and the White House does not give Republicans sufficient clout to fundamentally change the bill it is politically advantageous for the Republicans to keep the Democrats on the defensive on health care through the 2012 election cycle Prediction 2: Administrative proceedings with implementation of the big milestones will continue though there will be considerable friction and much name calling some

Read More
Search
We use cookies
This website collects cookies to deliver better user experience and to analyze our website traffic and performance; we never collect any personal data or target you with ads.