Jay Hancock

Jay Hancock is a senior correspondent for Kaiser Health News, an editorially-independent program of the Kaiser Family Foundation. He previously reported for the The Baltimore Sun, The Virginian-Pilot of Norfolk, and the Daily Press of Newport News. Contact him at jhancock@lkff.org.

Articles by Jay Hancock

Benefits, HR News & Trends

Aetna Cuts Predictions For First Year Enrollments Under Obamacare

by on May 2, 2013, 8:42 AM  |  No comments yet
Health care reform11

In a new sign that implementing the health law could take longer than expected, insurer Aetna said Tuesday it lowered the number of medical policies it expects to sell through online marketplaces that open for business in October.

“This is going to be a slow uptake,” Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini told investment analysts on a quarterly call to discuss financial results. “The process required to sign up, to get the subsidies, is going to take some time. And I think this is a two-year ramp to get the individual exchanges up to a level where customers are going to feel appropriate signing up. And so our estimates of what we believe … enrollment [will be] are dropping for the first year.”

He didn’t give a number, and insurers rarely disclose projections for specific business lines. But Aetna offered nothing to challenge perceptions that it will approach the Affordable Care Act’s subsidized marketplaces, also known as exchanges, with great deliberation. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Benefits, HR Basics

Do Your Employees Know That Preventive Health Care is Free?

by on Dec 5, 2012, 12:27 PM  |  2 Comments
Health care communications

Researchers have known that members of high-deductible health plans, a rapidly growing type of coverage, seem to get less preventive care than people who pay lower out-of-pocket costs.

But evidence for why was scanty. After all, under the 2010 Affordable Care Act many preventive screenings and treatments are covered with no out-of-pocket cost at all, even for high-deductible insurance.

Now policy pros at Kaiser Permanente, the giant health plan, have filled in some of the gaps. (Kaiser Health News is not affiliated with the insurer). Perhaps not surprisingly, their research shows that many consumers with high-deductible coverage think the deductible — which can run to thousands of dollars — applies to all doctor visits. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Benefits, HR News & Trends

Employer Health Care Costs Only Rise by 4%, Smallest Hike in 15 Years

by on Nov 15, 2012, 6:55 AM  |  No comments yet
123RF Stock Photo

Furnishing new evidence of slower growth in health costs, a new survey by consulting firm Mercer said Wednesday that employers spent 4.1 percent more on health benefits this year than in 2011. It was the smallest increase in 15 years.

One reason, but probably not the only one: Employers shifted costs to workers through higher deductibles.

Nearly 60 percent of very large employers (more than 20,000 workers) offer high-deductible, “consumer-directed” health plans, according to Mercer’s National Survey of Employer-Sponsored Health Plans. The portion of all employers offering consumer-directed plans rose from 17 percent last year to 22 percent in 2012, Mercer said. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Benefits, HR News & Trends

No Way Around It: President’s Win Cements Future of “ObamaCare”

by on Nov 7, 2012, 9:14 AM  |  No comments yet
Health care reform has been a key initiative of President Obama's administration.

President Barack Obama’s victory cements the Affordable Care Act, expanding coverage to millions but leaving weighty questions about how to pay for it and other care to be delivered to an increasingly unhealthy, aging population.

“The reelection of Obama and the Democrats holding the Senate will solidify the law in American history,” said Len Nichols, a health economist at George Mason University who supports what both sides have come to call “Obamacare.” “By 2016 you’ll see the vast majority of states with operational [insurance] exchanges and the Medicaid expansion, and we’ll be on a pathway to a more humane system.”

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney had promised to repeal the act and replace it with something that would loosen government’s involvement in health care. Conservatives portrayed the law’s survival as limiting the freedom of patient and doctor and adding to a federal debt that recently exceeded $16 trillion. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Benefits, HR News & Trends

Health Care Reform: Today’s Election Will Decide Its Ultimate Future

by on Nov 6, 2012, 9:16 AM  |  No comments yet
Health care reform2

The highest court in the country upheld most of the Affordable Care Act in June. But everybody knew it was only an overture.

The law “will fall in November by a vote of the American people,” Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant pledged that day, speaking for many other Republicans. Democrats were more reluctant to paint the election as a referendum on what even they came to call “Obamacare.” But privately they admitted the stakes.

A victory for President Barack Obama today would seal the health act’s future and continue its myriad attempts at reform that even Republicans admit would be difficult or impossible to reverse. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Benefits, HR News & Trends

Data Shows That Recessions Hurts Older Workers’ Long Term Health

by on Sep 17, 2012, 12:27 PM  |  No comments yet
123RF Stock Photo

There are 20 million Americans between 55 and 60. Nearly 1 million are unemployed, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

Many more lack health coverage, suggests the Census Bureau’s new report on income, poverty and health insurance. Thanks to the lousy economy, the whole group is at higher risk for long-term health problems and earlier death, suggests new research from Wellesley College.

Wellesley economist Phillip B. Levine and colleagues mashed mortality and employment data over the past four decades to find what you might expect but what had never been measured on this scale: Experiencing an economic recession in your late 50s, on average, isn’t just bad for your wallet. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Benefits, HR News & Trends

Hospitals Name Their Least Favorite Health Insurer to Deal With

by on Aug 21, 2012, 11:35 AM  |  No comments yet
Health care communications

It is a truth universally acknowledged that health insurance companies can be a pain for patients.

What may be a surprise is that hospitals often complain, too. For the same reasons: Denied claims. Low reimbursement. Late reimbursement. Thickets of red tape.

Each year ReviveHealth, a hospital public relations firm in Santa Barbara, Calif., asks hospitals to name the most problematic payers. This year’s loser: WellPoint, which “managed to have some pretty intense negative opinion” in the regions where it does business, said Revive President Brandon Edwards. “That vaults them above — or I should say below — all the other health plans, even those that operate in all 50″ states. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

HR News & Trends

The Downside of the Huge Growth in U.S. Health Care Jobs

by on Jun 8, 2012, 8:15 AM  |  No comments yet
healthcarejobs

Health care employment has been the bright spot in the otherwise lackluster recent jobs reports. As overall employment decreased by 2 percent from 2000 to 2010, employment in the health care sector actually increased by 25 percent.

But that’s not necessarily a good thing, according to an opinion piece published in the most recent edition of the New England Journal of Medicine.

“Treating the health care system like a (wildly inefficient) jobs program conflicts directly with the goal of ensuring that all Americans have access to care at an affordable price,” write Katherine Baicker and Amitabh Chandra, two researchers from Harvard. Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn

Benefits, HR News & Trends

Health Care Hiring Boom Projected To Continue, Regardless of Law

by on Apr 9, 2012, 10:37 AM  |  No comments yet
Health care reform has been a key initiative of President Obama's administration.

Health-care employment will continue to grow much faster than employment generally, with the number of jobs in home care and other ambulatory settings projected to jump more than 40 percent by 2020, a new study suggests.

New figures from the Labor Department highlight an expected hiring shift away from hospitals, as the system puts greater emphasis on preventive care and reduced admissions, said Jean Moore, director of the Center for Health Workforce Studies at the State University of New York at Albany. The center produced employment forecasts based on the government’s latest projections for occupational and industry growth.

“For a long time, acute-care services tended to trump everything else, and that seems to be changing,” Moore said. “There’s a growing awareness that it’s penny-wise and pound-foolish not to pay attention to preventive and primary care.” Read more…

Twitter Facebook LinkedIn