Health Insurance

Auto-enrollment in Medicaid and ACA insurance can cover more Americans and reduce health costs for all. New HKS research shows how.

Violin28/01/2023 39 Views

Headshot of Mark Shepard. For the estimated 30 million uninsured Americans, navigating insurance enrollment can be confusing, cumbersome, and intimidating. The hassles are so great that some people have avoided enrollment altogether, and that can be costly for everyone. And when the Biden administration lifts the COVID-19 public health emergency, as it plans to in April, another 18 million people could lose Medicaid coverage.

But HKS Associate Professor Mark Shepard says there is good news for the insurance enrollment process. And he has the data to back it up. We spoke with Shepard about his new working paper, “Reducing Ordeals Through Automatic Enrollment: Evidence

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4 min read

Health Insurance

False claim that Biden’s executive order gives Americans free health insurance

Violin27/01/2023 47 Views

The claim: Biden’s executive order gives free health insurance

A Jan. 9 Facebook clip (direct link, archived link) shows President Joe Biden signing directives at the White House.

“Your 2023 Relief Package Is Here!,” reads the caption of the post. “President Biden signed Executive Order 14009 making Health Insurance FREE for qualifying Americans. Thanks to the Affordable Cart (sic) Act, American’s (sic) with less than $50k/year income now qualify to get Health Plans for as low as $0/month .”

The post generated over 60,000 views in less than two weeks.

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3 min read

Health Insurance

Amendments will better protect BC strata owners, lessen insurance costs

Violin27/01/2023 43 Views

Amendments to the minimum amount of developers and strata corporations must contribute to contingency reserve funds will help protect owners in the small number of stratas that are neglecting maintenance needs and risking higher insurance costs.

“People living in strata deserve to have peace of mind that their strata corporation has appropriate reserves to do routine maintenance and keep strata insurance costs down,” said Ravi Kahlon, Minister of Housing. “The overwhelming majority of strata are doing just that, but a small number of strata corporations that are underfunding their contingency funds and putting owners at risk of surprise fee hikes

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4 min read

Health Insurance

Legal Documents for Your Graduating Senior

Violin27/01/2023 51 Views

If you are a parent with a child who will graduate from high school soon, now is a good time to start planning what documents the child will need moving forward.

We can help you stay on top of the latest news that affects your everyday life. Subscribe to stay up to date. (To subscribe to our blog click here).

If you have a child who recently turned 18, you need to start thinking about the potential legal implications and how best to protect your child’s interests. Estate planning is not always about planning for death, but it is

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3 min read

Health Insurance

Elevance Health to Acquire Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana

Violin26/01/2023 59 Views

What You Need to Know

Elevance has 47 million health plan enrollees.
Louisiana Blue has 1.9 million enrollees.
One thing both have in common: a relatively low share of the private Medicare plan market.

Elevance Health — the health insurance giant formerly known as Anthem — has agreed to acquire Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Louisiana.

Elevance, an Indianapolis-based company with about $160 billion in annual revenue and 47 million health plan enrollees, would be getting a Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based carrier with $4 billion in annual revenue and 1.9 million health plan enrollees.

Elevance expects to pay for Louisiana

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2 min read

Health Insurance

More and More Doctors Are Billing for Email Advice

Violin25/01/2023 54 Views

A patient sitting at the table in an exam room and speaking with the doctor.

Image source: Getty Images

what happened

Email medical advice is costing patients anything from copays of $3 to charges of $100, according to recent reports. Not only has the volume of email consultations increased dramatically in recent years, but new billing rules allow healthcare providers to charge for so-called “e-visits.” As a result, some doctors now charge for the service.

So what

As a patient, the idea that you might have to pay for email communications on top of other healthcare costs can be very disturbing, especially if you’re not clear on what you might be charged. Some patient advocate

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3 min read

Health Insurance

MAPS offering health insurance enrollment assistance

Violin25/01/2023 47 Views

CAMBRIDGE – The Massachusetts Alliance of Portuguese Speakers (MAPS) has recently partnered with the Massachusetts Health Connector to offer health insurance enrollment assistance and information to uninsured community members.

This free assistance will be provided in English, Portuguese or Cabo Verdean Creole out of MAPS’ six offices throughout Massachusetts.

MAPS Case Worker Maria Matos offers health insurance enrollment assistance to a client.

“This is an important step towards our mission of removing barriers and increasing access to healthcare among our communities,” said MAPS CEO Paulo Pinto. “We are honored to become a Navigator agency again and look forward to collaborating with the Massachusetts Health Connector towards building healthy and successful communities.”

MAPS has

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2 min read

Health Insurance

Can I Terminate My Physician Employment Agreement?

Violin25/01/2023 46 Views

Many of our physician clients are unaware of their termination rights prior to meeting with us.

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If you want to terminate your employment, the first thing you need to do is read your contract.

Most physician employment agreements have substantial termination provisions. You need to know what yours says regarding termination with and without cause, what notice is required, and what other provisions will be triggered by termination.

Many times,

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3 min read