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?
Healthcare Systems & Policy
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.
This webinar will help journalists contextualize private-payer data, discuss possible policy responses, and offer suggestions for how reporters can use this resource to bolster their reporting.
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."
Malik Stanton is among 2 million children in Florida — about half the state’s under-20 population — who depend on the state’s $24 billion Medicaid program for health care. That same health care system very nearly let him die.
This week brought news of a compromise in the battle over new school lunch standards. It comes quick on the heels of new research that questions critics' claims of tossed food and lost revenues.
Delaying care or not getting any at all puts the baby and the mother at greater risk of serious medical problems, and Bexar County, Tex., has one of the highest rates in the nation of premature births. So what might be done to ensure mothers get better care, despite scarce resources?