A federal judge blocked the Medi-Cal payment reductions that were to help California reduce it's budget deficit by $623 million. U.S. District Court Judge Christina A. Snyder ruled that the state can not reduce payments to doctors, dentists, and other providers by 10%. This ruling will help to lessen the burden being placed on the lowest income members of California. The proposed 10% cuts would have caused an even greater loss of medical professionals that would agree to treat Medi-Cal patients. Most Medi-Cal providers state that providing benefits to these people is a "contribution" physicians make to society, because doing so costs them money.
California officials state that the proposed cuts would still allow the state to meet the standards of care set forth by the federal government. They anticipate the ruling will be overturned.
Stay tuned for more...
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Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Do We Want A Single Payer Health Care System In California?
The California state Senate came up 1 vote short of passing another version of a single payer health care system. The proposed "single-payer" would be the California state government. Where the money to pay for the new program would come from, nobody knows. It's not like California has a budget surplus and can create expensive programs out of thin air.
Democratic state Senators argue that the large European countries all have single payer systems so California should as well. The Republicans counter with the idea that following the economically struggling European countries "down the rabbits hold" doesn't look like a sound and well thought out solution.
Stay tuned for more on this topic.
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Democratic state Senators argue that the large European countries all have single payer systems so California should as well. The Republicans counter with the idea that following the economically struggling European countries "down the rabbits hold" doesn't look like a sound and well thought out solution.
Stay tuned for more on this topic.
http://sw-andalusian-club.com/?p=1079
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Saturday, January 28, 2012
Here's A Case Study In Affordable Health Insurance
A recent client called me to ask about getting health insurance for her family and wanted to ask some questions to make sure she was on the right track. After a few minutes I found out that she and her husband wanted to have children, so maternity insurance was important. Her plan was to get the cheapest pregnancy insurance plan she could find, and put the whole family on it (herself, her husband, and their 4 year old daughter).
I quickly pointed out that her husband and daughter did not need the extra benefits of maternity care, and that having a family deductible would double her out of pocket costs for the prenatal and delivery costs. My recommendation was to put her husband and daughter on a separate non-maternity health insurance plan, and put her on a maternity plan that would minimize her out of pocket costs.
Her initial plan would have put everyone in the family into the Anthem Blue Cross Lumenous HSA 5000 plan, at a cost of $612/month. My strategy put her into the Blue Shield PPO 5000 plan and her husband and daughter into the Anthem Blue Cross ClearProtection 5000 plan for a combined cost of $320/month.
She was so happy to realize that they would easily be able to afford the monthly premium costs, and by looking at the California Maternity Health Insurance page on the SPF Insurance website, she knew what her expected costs for the pregnancy would be. To get affordable health insurance San Diego couples need to work with an expert health broker to find the best solution.
Stop back for more case studies in the future.
Friday, January 27, 2012
New Report Shows Number Of Uninsured Still Rising
A new Gallup survey shows that in 2011, 17.1 percent of all Americans did not have health insurance. This is up from 16.4 percent uninsured in 2010. The trend is still climbing even with the start of health care reform. The economy is one of the main contributors to the increase, but uncertainty around the health care reform package is making many people wait to see what happens in 2014.
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An analysis by the Associated Press shows that most of the uninsured live in states where the health care exchange efforts have not yet started.
Let's hope thing begin to change for the better, or the beginning of 2014 is going to be very interesting.
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An analysis by the Associated Press shows that most of the uninsured live in states where the health care exchange efforts have not yet started.
Let's hope thing begin to change for the better, or the beginning of 2014 is going to be very interesting.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Maternity insurance anyone? Here's a good source for pregnancy insurance california...http://ping.fm/P0D93
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Anthem Blue Cross of California Introduces ACO Plans
Anthem Blue Cross announced new plans that will utilizing the Accountable Care Organizations that they have introduced in Los Angeles, Santa Clara, and San Diego California. Accountable Care Organizations (ACO) were created by health care reform as a method of controlling health care costs better.
These new plans are available for small businesses in the 3 areas listed above. The plans provide the flexibility of a PPO with the cost and care advantages of an HMO.
The plans utilize a three tier network of providers. The highest benefit tier uses the new ACO providers to manage the cost of patient care, and provides the lowest costs for the patient. The next lower tier uses the normal Blue Cross PPO network of providers and will maintain the standard costs to the patient. The last tier is the "out of network" providers that will cost patients more to use, but provides access to any doctor at any time.
These plans will become available starting April 1st, 2012.
Monday, January 23, 2012
Sunday, January 22, 2012
The Passing of Joe Paterno is Heart Felt
The news this morning of Joe Paterno death is a heavy blow to all college football fans. His name will always be looked upon as a champion of winning, and doing the basic dirty work to succeed. The recent events about one of his assistant coaches can not dim the flame he started burning. His torch will be carried in the hearts of all football players for the next generation.
My thoughts go out to the Paterno family, and I hope they know how we fans feel about the man. He was a great man.
Rest in peace Joe....
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My thoughts go out to the Paterno family, and I hope they know how we fans feel about the man. He was a great man.
Rest in peace Joe....
http://www.vamosmexico.info/
Friday, January 20, 2012
Lot's of people ask me about dental insurance in San Diego. They want to know if they can get dental insurance to help reduce the cost of the dental care of cavities or root canals. When getting dental insurance San Diego that need immediate care will have to use an HMO dental plan or a discount plan. Find more details about this here...http://ping.fm/aTSqe
IRS Provides New Guidance On W2's For Small Businesses
The IRS has issued new guidance regarding companies having to add health benefits to employee W2 forms by the end of 2012. The new guidance says that businesses with less than 250 W2 employees will not have to add the health benefit information this year, but companies with greater than 250 employees will have to meet this deadline.
This is great news for businesses with fewer employees. The IRS said that the guidance with stay in force until in the IRS issues new changes.
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This is great news for businesses with fewer employees. The IRS said that the guidance with stay in force until in the IRS issues new changes.
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Thursday, January 19, 2012
Health Care Reform Changes for 2012
The changes coming in 2012 will be mostly cosmetic and in preparation for 2014. Small Businesses will bear the brunt of most changes, but there will be some modifications for the individual marketplace as well.
The big changes for small business are the preparation for W2 changes that the IRS has mandated for 2013, in which businesses will have to report the value of each employee's health insurance benefits on the employee's W2. Other changes are due to the minimum benefit health plan definitions that the federal Health and Human Services department decided to pass on to the states to decide. In California, the insurance companies have been asked to provide the state with their most popular individual and small group health insurance plans. The state intends to use this information to help guide the definition of the minimum benefit standards.
For individuals in California, the state decided to require that all individual health plans provide maternity care starting on July 1st 2012. This will result in a costly new benefit being added to all plans that don't currently offer maternity care, and therefore will likely increase premiums for everyone.
Stay tuned for further updates....
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The big changes for small business are the preparation for W2 changes that the IRS has mandated for 2013, in which businesses will have to report the value of each employee's health insurance benefits on the employee's W2. Other changes are due to the minimum benefit health plan definitions that the federal Health and Human Services department decided to pass on to the states to decide. In California, the insurance companies have been asked to provide the state with their most popular individual and small group health insurance plans. The state intends to use this information to help guide the definition of the minimum benefit standards.
For individuals in California, the state decided to require that all individual health plans provide maternity care starting on July 1st 2012. This will result in a costly new benefit being added to all plans that don't currently offer maternity care, and therefore will likely increase premiums for everyone.
Stay tuned for further updates....
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http://jimenglandweb.com/
http://hvatit.info/
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Looking for ways to get affordable dental insurance San Diego natives should look at this article...http://ping.fm/sGylS
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Update on Health Care Reform in 2012
The Affordable Care Act continues to roll out, and there are new changes that will take place in 2012. These changes will require businesses, insurance companies, state regulatory agencies and everyday people to do things a little differently.
Big change for businesses is the requirement to report the cost of health insurance benefits, provided by the company, on each employee's W2's next year. The change for State Insurance Departments is for them to define what the required minimum benefit levels will be for health insurance plans that will be in force on Jan 1st 2014, and to continue building health insurance exchanges that consumers can use to shop for post-2014 insurance plans.
None of these changes will be easy, and the tweaks and modifications to health care reform happen on a regular basis. So it's important to keep on top of these changes so you can prepare for what's to come.
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Big change for businesses is the requirement to report the cost of health insurance benefits, provided by the company, on each employee's W2's next year. The change for State Insurance Departments is for them to define what the required minimum benefit levels will be for health insurance plans that will be in force on Jan 1st 2014, and to continue building health insurance exchanges that consumers can use to shop for post-2014 insurance plans.
None of these changes will be easy, and the tweaks and modifications to health care reform happen on a regular basis. So it's important to keep on top of these changes so you can prepare for what's to come.
http://wowquiz.com/
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Friday, January 6, 2012
Thursday, January 5, 2012
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Monday, January 2, 2012
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