Evidence is emerging that Annual Wellness Visits, the preventive health benefit for Medicare enrollees created by the Affordable Care Act, are achieving their intended purpose—linking people with preventive services. But not all demographic groups are gaining the benefits equally
Recent research shows that Medicare's Annual Wellness Visit appears to be achieving one of its key goals: providing a gateway for beneficial preventive and screening services
The Food and Drug Administration recently proposed to substantially alter the approval process for many medical devices
All too often, older patients are given drugs and other therapies that have not been tested on people beyond a certain age
Lower hearing aid costs will be good news for consumers, especially seniors with hearing loss
The June 5 release of the Medicare Trustees Report has triggered alarm bell-style media headlines. Dozens of news reports about Medicare’s worsening financial outlook have painted a bleak picture—some bleaker than others, with one boldface headline announcing, “Medicare will go broke three years earlier than expected.”
In 2011, some widely used implantable heart defibrillators, designed to correct potentially fatal irregular heart rhythms, developed cracked insulation on their high-voltage electrical wires. The result was that in some cases they caused severe shocks, and even deaths.
Implantable devices, such as hip replacements and heart valves, are a central part of medical treatment today. Americans receive about 370,000 cardiac pacemakers and about 1 million total hip and knee replacements per year. Despite how common the use of implantable devices is, little information is publicly available on the prices paid for these devices in the United States. Limited information about prices and performance of many implantable devices has raised concerns that providers, consumers and insurers may be paying too much for these devices.
If you’re one of the roughly 2 million Medicare beneficiaries placed under observation each year, there’s (potentially) good news for you: You may be less vulnerable to sticker shock when you get your medical bill. But Medicare hasn’t gotten the details right just yet.
Since October 2012, the Medicare program has penalized hospitals when too many patients in traditional Medicare are re-hospitalized within a month of discharge. This policy appears to be having unintended consequences for patients in Medicare and in the commercial market.