The independent source for health policy research, polling, and news.
Michelle Andrews is a contributing writer and former columnist for ϳԹ News. She has been writing about health care for more than 15 years. Her work has appeared frequently in The New York Times, where she wrote the Money and Medicine column and contributed regular news and features. Her work has also been published in Money, Fortune Small Business, National Geographic and Women’s Health magazines, among others. Michelle previously worked as a senior writer at U.S. News & World Report and at SmartMoney magazines. She has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin and a master’s in journalism from Columbia University.
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A law signed by Trump on Wednesday will provide financial help for self-employed workers, who generally don’t have paid leave. Some states also have family and medical leave programs that can be helpful.
If you are sick from the coronavirus outbreak or sent home, your financial protections may vary depending on what state you live in.
A new state law limits what consumers owe if they’re transported by an air ambulance that’s not part of their insurance network to the amount that they’d be charged if they used an in-network provider. But the law won’t protect millions of consumers whose health plans aren’t regulated by the state.
Suicide rates across the country have been rising for 20 years. That’s true in New York, too, but even so, its rate is about half that of the country as a whole.
A California law, which took effect in July 2017, protects consumers who use an in-network hospital or other facility from surprise bills when cared for by an out-of-network doctor. But physicians say the law has allowed insurers to shrink networks, limiting access to those doctors who have contracted with the patients’ insurance plans.
Firms are offering more traditional plans alongside or instead of the plans with sky-high deductibles that may have been the only option in the past. The change comes as employers are finding that workers like the predictability of a traditional plan and that providing more generous plans can help with recruiting in a tight labor market.
Many states have rules that keep parents from knowing about or consenting to certain types of care for their children, including mental health and drug and alcohol treatment. Washington state, however, has revised its policies.
People at companies with large numbers of people earning $25,000 or less faced bigger deductibles for single coverage and were asked to pony up a larger share of their income in premiums than those at other firms.
New York, where nearly 900 people contracted measles this year, has enacted contentious requirements for immunizations.
For nearly 50 years, cigarette advertising has been banned from TV and radio. But the marketing of electronic cigarettes isn’t constrained by that law.
A federal advisory panel says people between ages 27 and 45 may benefit from the vaccine to fight the human papillomavirus. But some public health advocates worry that the advice doesn’t provide doctors and patients clear guidance about who in this large age group are good candidates for the vaccine.
More than 400,000 U.S. workers have retired in foreign countries and their ranks are rising. But Medicare doesn’t cover most expenses overseas, so these expats will need to confront the cost of finding alternative insurance.
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommended that people who are at high risk of contracting HIV take PrEP, a preventive treatment. The decision means most health plans will be required to cover the drugs without charging patients. But the recommendation doesn’t apply to the other clinical and lab services people need.
Under federal law, people who have been raped don’t have to pay for medical forensic exams, yet many get billed and have trouble getting the hospitals or collection agencies to stop dunning them for payment.
The scientific use of tissue from aborted fetuses has frequently been a hot point of contention between anti-abortion forces and researchers. It heats up again as federal officials announced this week they were ending NIH research using the tissue.
More than half of Americans contacted about an overdue bill said it related to medical debt. A federal agency has proposed new guidance for what debt collectors are allowed to do when pursuing many types of overdue consumer bills, including medical debt. But some consumer advocates have panned the effort.
Many plastic surgeons don’t participate in health plans, even when providing emergency care at a hospital. Too often that catches patients off guard.
Beneficiaries pay 25 percent of the price of their brand-name drugs until they reach $5,100 in out-of-pocket costs. After that, their obligation drops to 5 percent. But it never disappears.
Medicare doesn’t pay for an annual physical, but it does cover an annual wellness visit focused on preventing disease and disability by coming up with a “personalized prevention plan” for future medical issues. It is important to use the correct term when scheduling a doctor’s visit.
How "noncompete" clauses in contracts between doctors and hospitals or clinics prevent patients from seeing their longtime doctors.
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