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.
Healthcare Systems & Policy
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?
A study looking at births in Britain finds home-births safer, while another U.S. study finds babies born at home face higher risk of death. It turns out having ways to get moms to the hospital quickly when complications arise might be the most important variable.
Waiting for Medicaid eligibility is a common experience in Bexar County, Tex., and one big reason why women don't receive prenatal care as early as they should. It contributes to the rising number of babies born to women who received prenatal care after their first trimester — or not at all.
Thousands of babies are born every year in Bexar County, Texas, to mothers who receive no prenatal care. Those women are more likely to give birth prematurely, increasing the odds that their newborns will develop immediate and long-lasting health problems that can be both costly and fatal.
We thought we knew the main reasons why doctors perform too many C-sections in the U.S. But a recently reported study points to another cause: Doctors are often wrong in predicting babies' weight, and that can lead to unnecessary cesareans.
Are insurance policies too complicated to understand? They always have been and always will be unless there are changes in the way policies work, or until there are rules to make it easier for buyers to compare options.