Clik here to view.
Are Insurance Companies the Key to Lower Prices?
Two patients lie asleep on operating room tables, each with an inflamed appendix demanding to be relocated to a specimen jar. Two operations take place, each one lasting close to fifty minutes, each...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Exciting New Breast Cancer Drug Poised to Break the Bank?
In exciting news for breast cancer patients, the FDA recently approved Perjeta, a new treatment for metastatic breast cancer that delays progression of the disease by six months. But can we afford to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Health Insurance Exchange Decisions…So Far!
The Obamacare law establishes what are known as “health insurance exchanges” to help people compare health insurance plans. It is, when you think about it (heck: even when you DON’T think about it) a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Is the Penalty for Not Getting Health Insurance Too Small to Work?
As part of Obamacare, people are required to get health insurance or pay a penalty. That’s what’s known infamously as the individual mandate. But is the penalty too small to matter? For some people,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Will Obamacare Reduce the Crazy Variation in Hospital Prices?
If you have been paying attention to US healthcare policy debates lately, you know that hospitals have a price problem. Walk across the street from one hospital to a competitor hospital, and you could...
View ArticleClik here to view.
The Problem With Obamacare’s 50 Employee Cutoff
Imagine you are a small business owner deciding whether to hire two new employees, your 50th and 51st workers respectively. Would you hire them knowing that, by surpassing the magic number 50, you will...
View ArticleWhat Does Health Insurance Consolidation Mean for You?
Listen to this Marketplace report on consolidation in the world of health insurance. It is an interesting report, and also the first public acknowledgment that I am, gulp, a Business Professor!
View ArticleClik here to view.
Should Chemotherapy Cost More on Hot Days?
It was 93 degrees and humid. Jimmy Lawrence put his first five quarters into the vending machine and selected a Coke. The machine refused to give him his beverage. Because the temperature was more...
View ArticleAre Rare Diseases Too Expensive to Treat?
See this great piece by a reporter at Forbes discussing why rare disease treatments can cost as much as $400,000 per patient, per year. You will get a glimpse of my take on this topic too, but I plan...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Health Cost Decisions in the Real World
When Rita Volk, a busy college student, first experienced a nagging sensation in her right ear, she ignored it. Even though she felt like she was traveling in an under-pressurized airplane, Volk...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Should Patients Be Able to Receive “PFO Occluders” Outside of Research Trials?
Ten years ago, my tennis partner suffered a stroke. He was a sixty-year-old at the time, working to move up into the top ten players in his age group. In the country! You could not have found a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Let the Health Insurance Exchanges Begin!
Pretty soon, people will be able to start shopping for health insurance on the infamous Obamacare exchanges. In North Carolina, one of the states asking the feds to take the lead in this effort, only...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Fear Mongering in Obamacare Debates
Here is a link to a story run by Marketplace on the crazy advertisements trying to influence whether people buy health insurance on the new Obamacare health insurance exchanges. The producers at...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Blue Cross Previews Health-Exchange Plan Rates
Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina will offer individual health plans through new on-line exchanges ranging from $185 for the lowest-cost plan for 25-year-olds to $947 for the top plan for a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Great Video Explaining Health Insurance Exchanges
Regular followers of my blog probably realize by now that I am a big fan of Sarah Kliff , at the Washington Post, who does a great job of reporting on the many ups and downs of Obamacare. Here is a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Debate Rages Over Obamacare, Medical Costs
When Dr. Jeffrey Rice needed to schedule outpatient foot surgery for his son three years ago, he called the recommended facility to find out what it would cost. The estimate was so high — $15,000 to...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Bargaining Power in Health Plan Negotiations
Thousands of children have passed through the doors of Vanderbilt’s Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital. The lobby is bright, full of natural light and decorated in bold colors and kid-friendly...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Health Insurance Exchanges in One Picture
Here is an excellent picture from the New England Journal of Medicine, illustrating which states have chosen to run their own exchanges, which are relying on the federal government, and which are...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Obamacare and the End of Employer-Based Health Insurance
According to the American Action Forum, 43 million American workers will lose access to employer-based health insurance coverage because of Obamacare. Critics of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) have...
View ArticleClik here to view.
What Do People Think About When Choosing Health Insurance Plans?
Here is a discussion I had with Tess Vigeland of Los Angeles Public Radio about the psychology of choosing health plans. (Click here to view comments)
View Article
