Americans are significantly more likely to skip health care due to cost considerations and struggle paying their medical bills than citizens in other high-income nations, a new report finds.

The nonprofit health care research group, the Commonwealth Fund, looked at more than 20,000 adults from 11 high-income countries: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom and United States.

The subjects were surveyed about their experiences with their country's health care system, focusing on access to care and how much it costs.

Researchers found because of costs, 37 percent of U.S. adults went without recommended medical care, did not see a doctor when ill or failed to fill a prescription. For comparison, 4 percent of British responders and 6 percent of Swedish ones reported they skipped medical care due to finances.

Uninsured U.S. adults were most likely to struggle with health care costs, but the report found even those who were covered year-round were still more likely to not get medical care due costs, struggle with bills or pay more out-of-pocket than insured adults in other countries.

"The U.S. spends more on health care than any other country, but what we get for these significant resources falls short in terms of access to care, affordability, and quality," Commonwealth Fund president Dr. David Blumenthal, said in a statement.

Twenty-three percent of Americans said they had major problems paying medical bills or couldn't pay them at all, while the country with the next highest rate, France, had 13 percent of adults reporting similar financial problems. Following those nations were the U.K., Sweden and Norway, with 6 percent or fewer citizens reporting problems.

Out-of-pocket medical costs were also looked at. More than 40 percent of American adults said they spent $1,000 or more of their own cash on medical care in the past year, by far the highest rate of any country surveyed.

A similar 40-percent rate was observed for high out-of-pocket costs when looking only at insured American adults.

Overall, the U.S. outspent other high-income countries for health care to the tune of about $8,500 a person per person, followed by Norway at about $5,670 and Switzerland with around $5,640 health care dollars.

See original here:

Health care money woes more common in U.S. than other high-income nations

Lisa Mascaro Noam N. Levey And Michael A. Memoli

WASHINGTON Newly released figures show enrollments for coverage under President Barack Obamas health care plan fell far below official projections, underscoring the damage inflicted by the botched rollout and further endangering the administrations support among restive Democrats on CapitolHill.

Just 106,185 Americans successfully enrolled in health coverage in October. The administration had hoped to get half a million people signed up in the Affordable Care Acts firstmonth.

To head off a revolt among lawmakers, White House officials said Wednesday they would have a plan soon perhaps by today to help millions of Americans whose

You have viewed 20 free articles or blogs allowed within a 30-day period. FREE registration is now required for uninterrupted access.

S-R Media, The Spokesman-Review and Spokesman.com are happy to assist you. Contact Customer Service by email or call 800-338-8801

WASHINGTON Newly released figures show enrollments for coverage under President Barack Obamas health care plan fell far below official projections, underscoring the damage inflicted by the botched rollout and further endangering the administrations support among restive Democrats on CapitolHill.

Just 106,185 Americans successfully enrolled in health coverage in October. The administration had hoped to get half a million people signed up in the Affordable Care Acts firstmonth.

To head off a revolt among lawmakers, White House officials said Wednesday they would have a plan soon perhaps by today to help millions of Americans whose current health plans are being canceled because they dont meet the lawsstandards.

Administration officials also sought to reassure doubters that the online marketplaces created by the law would be viable, emphasizing strong consumer interest in shopping for health insurance through the Affordable Care Act, also known asObamacare.

Excerpt from:

Federal health care enrollments fall far below targets in October - Thu, 14 Nov 2013 PST

FILE - In this Oct. 30, 2013 file photo, former President Bill Clinton speaks in Charlottesville, Va. (Steve Helber, AP Photo File)

WASHINGTON Adding pressure to fix the administration's problem-plagued health care program, former President Bill Clinton said President Barack Obama should accept changes to his health care law if that's what it takes to fulfill his promise that Americans who like their health insurance can keep it.

"Even if it takes a change to the law, the president should honor the commitment the federal government made to those people and let them keep what they've got," Clinton said in an interview posted Tuesday by Ozy.com, a media startup backed by Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Apple founder Steve Jobs.

The Daily Dose prescribes an enriched mix of news, features, consumer issues and in-depth followups to The Denver Post's coverage of medicine and health care.

The former president, a Democrat who has helped Obama promote the 3-year-old health law, becomes the latest in Obama's party to urge the president to live up to a promise he made repeatedly, declaring that the if Americans liked their health care coverage, they would be able to keep it under the new law.

Republicans seized on Clinton's remarks. House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio said the comments "signify a growing recognition that Americans were misled when they were promised that they could keep their coverage under President Obama's health care law."

While Clinton generally praised the health care law, Boehner called it "a train wreck that needs to go."

Meanwhile, software problems with the federal online health insurance exchange, especially in handling high volumes, are proving so stubborn that the system is unlikely to work fully by the end of the month as the White House has promised, an official with knowledge of the project told The Washington Post.

The exchange is balking when more than 20,000 to 30,000 people attempt to use it at the same time about half its intended capacity, said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to disclose internal information. And the main contractor who built the site, CGI Federal, has been able to fix only about six of every 10 defects.

Government workers and technical contractors racing to repair the website have concluded, the official said, that the only way for large numbers of Americans to enroll in the health care plans soon is by using other means so that the online system isn't overburdened.

Continued here:

Bill Clinton says Obama should honor health care pledge

Enzi responds to constituent questions on American #39;s losing health care, EPA
American #39;s losing their health care they like and the EPA taking its coal-killing rule on a faux listening tour, but missing stops in Wyoming, West Virginia ...

By: SenatorEnzi

See the article here:

Enzi responds to constituent questions on American's losing health care, EPA - Video

PPACA 05 Health Care Exchanges
Intro to the patient protection and affordable care act, also known as Obama care. This is the health care environment in which we will be practicing so we s...

By: Rahul Patwari

Read more here:

PPACA 05 Health Care Exchanges - Video

Current ratings for: US health care analysis: 'national conversation needed'

Ratings require JavaScript to be enabled.

Although the US health care system has experienced financial success, an analysis identifying trends in economics, costs and value from 1980 to 2011 reveals that the health care system has underperformed in certain areas, compared with similar countries.

And though the report highlights some improvements in outcomes, the pace of progress is much slower than in past decades.

The analysis was undertaken by Dr. Hamilton Moses III, of the Alerion Institute and the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, along with colleagues from The Boston Consulting Group and the University of Rochester. Results of the analysis were recently published in JAMA.

The team used publicly available data to analyze the economics of health care, the profile of people who receive care, organizations that provide care, and objective health outcomes and perceptions of care quality.

On the economic front, the investigators found that government funding toward health care increased from 31% in 1980 to 42% in 2011, however, costs have tripled over the past 20 years.

Even though resources devoted to health care have increased, the team found that in several health metrics, including life expectancy at birth and disease survival, the US is behind other comparable countries.

Since 2000, the team found that the price of professional services, drugs, devices and administrative costs - not service demand or an aging population - was responsible for 91% of the cost increases.

Additionally, chronic illnesses were responsible for 84% of overall costs in the entire population, not only in the elderly, the investigators note.

See the original post:

US health care analysis: 'national conversation needed'

Obamacare: New rules boost access to mental health care for millions
In an effort to reduce gun violence, new rules are expanding access to mental health treatment as part of Obamacare. The issue was brought to the national st...

By: CBS This Morning

See the original post:

Obamacare: New rules boost access to mental health care for millions - Video

BISMARCK, N.D. Health care providers told lawmakers Tuesday that new signups for health insurance are running below projections in the weeks following the open enrollment period under federal health care legislation.

Officials with Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Dakota and Sanford Health Plan took part in a panel discussion on implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act at the state Capitol. The discussion was part of a meeting of the interim Health Care Reform Review Committee.

Luther Stueland, director of health policy impact and exchanges for Blue Cross, provided updated enrollment figures through Nov. 4 to the committee.

Stueland said the company had received 118 contracts for insurance since the open enrollment period through the Affordable Care Act began Oct. 1. Of those, 24 were through the federally-run state health insurance exchange. The rest were through other means, he said.

"While these numbers are smaller than we had projected, we expect greater enrollment as Jan. 1 approaches and throughout the open enrollment period which ends March 31, 2014," Stueland said.

Stueland pointed to the highly publicized glitches in the federal health care insurance website leading to enrollment problems across the country. He said it appears many people may be waiting for the issues to be corrected.

Stueland said notices are being sent out to approximately 31,600 individual and small-group market customers whose non-grandfathered plans are to be discontinued.

"This accounts for roughly 8 percent of the 400,000 North Dakotans we serve," Stueland said.

Rep. Jim Kasper, R-Fargo, asked Stueland about the effects of possibly moving back the date of the individual mandate for having health insurance. Recently, there has been debate on the federal level over moving back the mandate by one year, which would require people to have insurance or pay a penalty beginning in 2014.

Kasper asked Stueland if Blue Cross would continue providing the current policies to the 31,600 customers set to receive notices. Stueland replied that Blue Cross would comply with federal law in the event of that occurring.

Read the original post:

Health care enrollments expected to increase

Louisiana Health Care Commission - Affordable Care Act

By: louisianahometown

Originally posted here:

Louisiana Health Care Commission - Affordable Care Act - Video

A Comparative History of Health Care Problems and Solutions in the United States and France
On Thursday, October 18th, the West European Studies Program along with the Global Health Initiative hosted a book discussion with Paul V. Dutton, Assistant ...

By: WoodrowWilsonCenter

Go here to see the original:

A Comparative History of Health Care Problems and Solutions in the United States and France - Video

Gore Vidal: State of the United States - Crime, Health Care, and Government Intrusion (1994)
Crime in the United States is described by annual Uniform Crime Reports by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and by annual National Crime Victimizati...

By: The Film Archive

See the original post:

Gore Vidal: State of the United States - Crime, Health Care, and Government Intrusion (1994) - Video

Health care event
Cleveland hosts health care event to help residents understand how to get access to affordable health insurance.

By: WEWS NewsChannel5

See the original post here:

Health care event - Video

Maranda: Where You Live: Evaluating a health care plan with Priority Health
Evaluating a health care plan with Priority Health.

By: marandatvonline

Go here to read the rest:

Maranda: Where You Live: Evaluating a health care plan with Priority Health - Video

NM Senators keep positive outlook on health care changes
As President Obama has apologized to the millions of Americans who feel they #39;ve been surprisingly dropped from their health insurance plans under new health ...

By: KRQE

See the article here:

NM Senators keep positive outlook on health care changes - Video

Naomi Fuchs is chief executive officer of Santa Rosa Community Health Centers, the largest federally qualified health center in the North Bay and the second largest provider of primary care in Sonoma County. She will be a panelist at the North Bay Business Journals upcoming Health Care Conference, which will feature a panel of providers and health insurance brokers detailing both the challenges and opportunities under the Affordable Care Act.

Q: The North Bay now has two Accountable Care Organizations, Meritage Medical Network and Redwood Community Care Organization. How does this impact the delivery of care, and can we expect more movement in this direction as providers plot health care reform strategies?

Naomi Fuchs

Ms. Fuchs: All health care providers are motivated to achieve the Triple Aim of improving the experience of care, improving the quality of care, and reducing the cost of care. One of the fundamental strategies for meeting this goal is strengthening the coordination of care across the continuum of services. The Accountable Care Organization (ACO) model creates the infrastructure and systems among health care partners to provide real-time clinical support to patients in a team-based model of care.

Q: What can the North Bay and the health care sector in general expect in terms of increased consolidation; and how might this affect the physician landscape in the future, as health systems and hospitals seek to add providers to their networks?

Ms. Fuchs: Private practice providers will likely want to affiliate with a larger health network in order to be part of community-wide systems of care. This will improve coordination, provide resources for care management, and ensure access to care for patients in ways that might not be possible as a small or solo provider.

Q: In order to provide more coordinated care across the North Bay landscape, every provider has mentioned the importance of patient data, whether a health plan, hospital, or health center. What are the challenges behind this, and how will this transform care? What efforts are you undertaking to address this?

Ms. Fuchs: The challenge is that everyone is on separate systems, and there is no unified language for exchanging information. Health care has barely evolved from a cottage industry with respect to information exchange. Accurate, up-to-date information is essential for care management and cost reduction. The person in the ER needs to know what medications a patient is taking, the specialists needs to know what tests have already been done and what the results are, the primary care provider needs to follow up in a timely way post-hospital discharge with accurate information about the care provided in the hospital.

Right now, this is being done through faxes and phone calls, weeks after the care has been provided or is self-reported by the patient. Currently, ERs and hospitals can look up information when granted appropriate security access, and hospitals are faxing admissions and discharge summaries.

We are about to launch a secure patient health card that a patient can present to an ER or inpatient admissions that has a secure chip (like your credit card) with their basic health record encoded on it; the hospital then has a card reader to access the information. With Redwood Community Health Coalition, community health centers are working on a community-wide project to share information across hospitals and specialists. We hope to complete this project in 2014.

See the rest here:

Health Care Conference 2013: Naomi Fuchs, Santa Rosa Community Health Centers

Health care

Jessica Silver-Greenberg and Susanne Craig The New York Times

10 hours ago

J. Emilio Flores / New York Times

Madeleine Mirzayans of Sherman Oaks, Calif., said a man came to her door and asked to help update her Medicare information.

To the list of problems plaguing President Obamas health care law, add one more fraud.

With millions of Americans frustrated and bewildered by the trouble-prone federal website for health insurance, con men and unscrupulous marketers are seizing their chance. State and federal authorities report a rising number of consumer complaints, ranging from deceptive sales practices to identity theft, linked to the Affordable Care Act.

Madeleine Mirzayans was fooled when a man posing as a government official knocked on her door. Barbara Miller and Maevis Ethan were pitched by telemarketers who claimed to work for Medicaid. And Buford Price was almost caught by another trap: websites that look official but are actually bait set by fly-by-night insurance operators.

Some level of fraud or abuse is predictable with any big government program, and administration officials expected a few bad actors to emerge. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.; Kathleen Sebelius, the secretary of health and human services; Edith Ramirez, the chairwoman of the Federal Trade Commission; and other officials met at the White House in September to discuss possible pitfalls.

But now, the technical failures troubling the HealthCare.gov website, as well as the laws complexity, threaten to make matters worse. Only a tiny fraction of Americans have been affected so far, but state authorities and the F.T.C. are reviewing the issue aggressively.

See more here:

Con men prey on confusion over health care act

By MICHAEL J. MISHAK Associated Press

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) - Rep. Patrick Murphy had been a cautious defender of President Barack Obama's health care law for much of the last year, telling constituents in his swing-voting district that the far-from-perfect measure is critical to helping cover uninsured Americans.

Then the new health care law made its disastrous debut. The federal health care website repeatedly crashed, blocking millions from browsing insurance plans. Questions about its security mounted. And cancellation notices hit people who buy their own plans, undercutting the president's vow that those who liked their coverage could keep it.

Now the South Florida lawmaker - one of nine Democrats representing districts Republican Mitt Romney won in 2012 - is distancing himself from the administration and heeding GOP calls to delay key parts of the health care law, illustrating the Democratic Party's challenge as it fights to keep control of the Senate and retake the House next year.

"It's a complete embarrassment," the Democratic freshman said recently. "There are no excuses for what happened here."

Nationwide, Democrats are nervous about the implications of defending an already unpopular law in the wake of the botched rollout, particularly in swing-voting districts and states. Last week, 16 Senate Democrats talked with Obama about fears the problems could hamper their re-election prospects, a day after two gubernatorial elections highlighted the party's struggles.

Mirroring national polls, half of New Jersey voters and 53 percent of Virginia voters said they oppose the law. The Democratic nominees in those races won 11 percent and 14 percent of those voters, respectively. Republicans attributed Virginia nominee Ken Cuccinelli's late surge in his failed bid to his vociferous opposition to the health care law.

Hoping for political gain heading into 2014, the GOP's top campaign committees are tying Democrats to the law's messy launch in a series of ads targeting women, who tend to vote Democratic and often make their families' health decisions.

Murphy and other Democrats anxious about the issue face a test on Friday, when the House is scheduled to vote on a bill to extend the life of individual health insurance policies that otherwise face cancellation under the new law on Jan. 1 because they don't meet minimum coverage standards. The legislation isn't likely to become law, but it's the latest GOP tactic to take advantage of the law's rocky launch.

Seeking to blunt the fallout, Murphy and other Democrats likely facing tough re-election challenges are pushing legislation to delay the requirement that virtually all Americans have health insurance or pay a fine until the website is certified as fully operational.

Original post:

Health care law could be liability for Democrats - NBC40.net

Telemedicine the exchange of medical information via electronic communications has vastly changed the way deployed soldiers receive access to health care. And now, this new communication system promises to offer better access to care for veterans in the future as well.

When Dr. Ronald Poropatich first joined the military 30 years ago, the digital cameras and web cams required for the use of telemedicine barely existed. Yet, during his career as the deputy director of the Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center in the United States Army, Poropatich helped revolutionize health care for soldiers by bringing telemedicine technology to army bases and field hospitals around the world including in Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Today, soldiers in Iraq or Afghanistan can get second opinions on tricky medical situations from doctors located halfway around the world. They can receive diagnoses from medical specialists even when none are stationed at their base. And they can access psychiatric care via Skype-like technology when stationed in remote locations.

Utilizing technology to diagnose and treatThough he was trained as a pulmonary critical care physician, Poropatich eventually became involved in telemedicine as a way of improving access to care for people in the military.When he was first deployed in 1993, to set up telemedicine capabilities in Somalia, the technology available to him was expensive and rudimentary.

I took a 1.5 megapixel $25,000 digital camera made by Kodak (to Somalia), Poropatich told FoxNews.com. Now you have a 10 or 15 megapixel camera on your cell phone.

Thirty years later, telemedicine has advanced greatly, allowing soldiers to email photos of electrocardiograms (EKGs) or skin rashes back to physicians back in the U.S., and receive feedback within approximately five hours, according to Poropatich. Soldiers can even use Skype-like technology to speak with specialists in real time over secure networks.

A soldier has a microphone, an earphone, and sits in front of a laptop with a webcam over a secure network thats HIPAA-compliant, Poropatich said. It meets military standards and medical standards, and its a private conversation.

This technology has allowed the military to spot medical conditions that would have otherwise been missed or quickly garner second opinions on cases that have the potential to warrant costly evacuations. They can also utilize the technology to spot false alarms, like in the case of one pilot that Poropatich treated who had an abnormal EKG reading.

If there are unusual findings on an EKG, and if theres no cardiologist around, then we have to ground that pilot, Poropatich said. But the beauty is I can now send it to a cardiologist and in this particular case we got a turnaround in 40 minutes saying this is normal, this guy can go back out today and fly.

Treating behavioral health issuesTelemedicine has also provided a way to treat soldiers for conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder, or depression, while preserving their privacy.

Continue reading here:

Telemedicine revolutionizes health care for soldiers

Linda Douglass Lies for Obama: The Truth About Health Care Insurance Reform
White House Linda Douglass was once a reporter for ABC and CBS News. Then she joined the White House to spin lies for Obama directly instead of indirectly th...

By: publiusforum

Read more from the original source:

Linda Douglass Lies for Obama: The Truth About Health Care Insurance Reform - Video

Charles Drew Health Center sees health care forum need
Charles Drew Health Center is calling the health care reform a win for a part of the community that needs it the most.

By: KETV NewsWatch 7

See the original post:

Charles Drew Health Center sees health care forum need - Video