“Thank you, and good morning. I’m Dr. Edward Langston, Board Chair of the American Medical Association and a family physician in Lafayette, Indiana. I’m pleased to be here today to represent the nation’s largest physician organization as part of this diverse group of voices supporting children’s health care.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced today that, after being found compliant with Medicare requirements through a comprehensive marketing review, seven health plan sponsors may resume marketing their Private-Fee-For-Service (PFFS) plans. The approvals allow the sponsors, as well as all other Medicare Advantage organizations, to market to newly eligible Medicare beneficiaries through October 1, 2007. The plans may also market to those beneficiaries with special enrollment periods.
Patients at an academic medical center who are cared for by a hospital-based general physician may have a shorter length of hospital stay than those who are not, especially if the patients require close monitoring or complex discharge planning, according to a report in the Sept. 24 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
An estimated 63.5 million US adults visited a physician for a preventive health or gynecological examination each year between 2002 and 2004, at an annual cost of approximately $7.8 billion, according to a report in the Sept. 24 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Despite decades of advances in diabetes care, African Americans and Latinos are still far less likely than whites to have their blood sugar under control, even with the help of medications, a new nationally representative study finds. That puts them at a much higher risk of blindness, heart attack, kidney failure, foot amputation and other long-term diabetes complications.
Providing health coverage to the uninsured is the most important health-related issue for presidential candidates to address among Democrats and Independents, while most Republicans say containing medical costs is most important, according to a recent Wall Street Journal Online/Harris Interactive poll.
A report on the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) showing increases in program enrollment, coverage, and access to health care among low-income, uninsured children was released today by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).
The American Medical Association (AMA) National House Call campaign visits New Mexico today and urges residents to help press Congress to stop scheduled Medicare cuts. Unless Congress intervenes, Medicare will slash physician payments 15 percent over the next two years beginning on Jan. 1, 2008.
A new consensus report published today in the ethics journal The Hastings Center Report outlines a basic ethical framework necessary for health system reform. The report, “Improving Access to Health Care: A Consensus Ethical Framework to Guide Proposals for Reform,” highlights key ethical obligations and recommendations to guide health system reform proposals in order to improve access to care.
Failing to pay attention to your vascular health could lead to potentially life-threatening conditions, including “silent” blood clots that travel through the bloodstream into the heart or lungs.