Obamacare enabled a wave of residents in California’s Central San Joaquin Valley to get health insurance, but finding doctors has been a recurring challenge for many. Is there any relief on the horizon?
Health Insurance and Costs
On health care, the talk from presidential candidates has been way too sketchy and uninformative, argues contributing editor Trudy Lieberman. Policy details remain vague, and no one has gotten to the heart of what ails the system.
Rural hospitals have been closing at alarming rate across the nation, including California's Central Valley. What happens to rural residents when a local hospital closes it doors? And is telemedicine really the solution?
A new Health Matters webinar this week explored just how different the health care spending map looks when researchers are given access to price and spending data from private insurance plans.
The specialty drug Orkambi, for cystic fibrosis, has a sticker price of $259,000 per year. What's driving these astronomical costs for specialty drugs? And can California's budget cope?
With the third open enrollment period closing last Sunday and predictions suggesting fewer sign-ups than expected, it’s time to be clear about why it’s so difficult to get the remaining holdouts insured.
“Dollars that were intended for a wide array of medical services started being gobbled up by just one drug,” said Charles Bacchi, president of an industry trade group.
Have we incentivized electronic checkboxes at the expense of more deliberate, thoughtful ways of practicing medicine? Dr. Monya De suggests that today's focus on efficiency and technology leaves little time for actual doctoring.
Jennifer’s experience in Florida’s Medicaid system isn't unique: She waited three months for her son’s appointment and drove 50 miles, only to have the doctor spend five minutes with him, ignore her concerns and tell her to go someplace else.
An unlikely coalition of health insurers, labor and consumer advocates are pushing for controls on high-cost drugs in the nation's most populous state. “California is truly ground zero for this fight,” one advocate said. “It is clear Congress as a whole is not going to take meaningful action."