Law and Practice of Private Health Insurance and Managed Care
Law and Practice of Private Health Insurance and Managed Care

Author: Christian Funk

Publisher: diplom.de

Published: 2000-04-28

Total Pages: 147

ISBN-13: 3832423214

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Inhaltsangabe:Abstract: A true revolution has taken place in the financing of health care in America. Today, managed care is dominating the way Americans receive and pay for their health care. With the rise of managed care medicine has been wrenched out of its atomized world of solo physician practices and community hospitals and has been transformed into a modern industry of giant for-profit companies traded on Wall Street. The current marketplace is characterized by mergers, acquisitions and the establishment of giant multi-billion dollar healthcare networks. Hospitals and managed care plans run big advertisement campaigns in the media, praising their products and services in order to get the biggest share possible of the $1.1 trillion America spends on health care each year. All parties involved in providing health care lobby for their interests at all levels of political decision-making in order to influence legislators and policymakers. Today s health care market changes quickly and at a high rate. New variations of managed care arise constantly making any analysis of managed care an ongoing game of "catch-up" with the marketplace. While writing this paper, for example, UnitedHealthcare dropped one of the major managed care instruments, utilization review, to address public s concerns and pending legislation. This paper will take a snapshot of managed care on the eve of the new millennium by using the most recent information available. After this introduction, the paper will give a description of the current American health care system in chapter two (The U.S. Health Care System). Then, the paper will focus on two aspects: A detailed description of managed care in chapter three (Managed Care) and an introduction of the main issues connected with this way of providing health care in chapter four (Managed Care issues). The paper will argue in chapter five (Results and Future Developments), that managed care of the future will be a light version of what is currently existing, resulting in less strict restrictions and more freedom for patients and doctors. Finally, the report will focus on recent developments in Germany, where policy-makers have started to adopt particular elements of managed care. In chapter six (Managed Care Approaches in Germany), the paper will argue, that Germany should pay more attention to the American experiences regarding managed care in order to prevent harm for patients in [...]

Paying for Health Insurance
Paying for Health Insurance

Author: David M. Cutler

Publisher:

Published: 1996

Total Pages: 52

ISBN-13:

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This paper uses data on health insurance choices by employees of Harvard University to examine the effect of alternative pricing rules on market equilibrium. In the mid-1990s, Harvard moved from a system of subsidizing more expensive insurance to a system of contributing an equal amount to each plan. We estimate a substantial demand response to the policy change, with a short-run elasticity of about -2. The reform also induced substantial" adverse selection. Because of this selection, the long-run demand response is three times the short-run response. Price variation induced by adverse selection is inefficient; we estimate the magnitude of the welfare loss from adverse selection at 2 percent of baseline health spending. Finally, as insurance choice was made more competitive, premiums to Harvard fell relative to premiums in the Boston area by nearly 10 percent. This savings was large enough to compensate for the inefficiency induced by adverse selection, so that reform overall was welfare enhancing

Care Without Coverage
Care Without Coverage

Author: Institute of Medicine

Publisher: National Academies Press

Published: 2002-06-20

Total Pages: 213

ISBN-13: 0309083435

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Many Americans believe that people who lack health insurance somehow get the care they really need. Care Without Coverage examines the real consequences for adults who lack health insurance. The study presents findings in the areas of prevention and screening, cancer, chronic illness, hospital-based care, and general health status. The committee looked at the consequences of being uninsured for people suffering from cancer, diabetes, HIV infection and AIDS, heart and kidney disease, mental illness, traumatic injuries, and heart attacks. It focused on the roughly 30 million-one in seven-working-age Americans without health insurance. This group does not include the population over 65 that is covered by Medicare or the nearly 10 million children who are uninsured in this country. The main findings of the report are that working-age Americans without health insurance are more likely to receive too little medical care and receive it too late; be sicker and die sooner; and receive poorer care when they are in the hospital, even for acute situations like a motor vehicle crash.

Health Watch
Health Watch

Author: United States. Health Care Financing Administration

Publisher:

Published: 2000-04

Total Pages: 8

ISBN-13:

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Size Matters
Size Matters

Author: Jill Mathews Yegain

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-07-23

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 042980024X

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First published in 1999, this volume responds to a large and growing interest among health policy and research circles on the use of purchasing alliances to leverage change in health care. This book gives detailed and useful specifics on how a leading alliance has fared in California, the most competitive health care market in the United States. Although it is generally accepted that large organizations are more effective purchasers of health insurance, little work has been done to carefully examine the reasons that underlie that phenomenon. Yet, creating interventions and designing potential solutions requires a thorough understanding of the issues. The econometric analysis adds to the limited literature on the influence of premium on choice behaviour for employees of small firms, and introduces an analysis of choice behaviour in a purchasing cooperative setting. The political section of this book presents a much more detailed historical account and analysis of California’s small group market reforms, the most significant health-related legislation in the state in the prior decade, than has been previously available. The conclusions are becoming particularly relevant, both in California and elsewhere, as the issues of reform of the individual market for health insurance comes to the forefront.