Health Insurance

Estate Planning Mistakes to Avoid in the New Year

Violin16/01/2023 71 Views

As we come to the end of the year and are looking toward a new year, we recommend that our clients reevaluate their estate plans.

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Estate plans are incredibly important to protect future wishes, assets and families.

Often, we see the same mistakes repeated over and over in estate planning. Some of the most common estate planning mistakes are the following:

Not having an estate plan. The biggest issue we

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3 min read

Health Insurance

Illinois fines health insurance company $500,000 for violations

Violin15/01/2023 111 Views

lawsuit — Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

Illinois has fined health insurance company Quartz $500,000 for failing to cover substance use disorder and mental health treatments at adequate levels.

Quartz sells health insurance plans on the Affordable Care Act exchange at healthcare.gov, and off the exchange, in parts of northwestern Illinois.

The Illinois Department of Insurance announced Wednesday that it had fined the insurance company for violations of federal and state laws that require insurers to offer the same level of coverage for mental health and substance use disorder care as they do for traditional medical and surgical care.

Attempts to reach Quartz

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2 min read

Health Insurance

Community Medical Group Announces Partnership with Ambetter from Sunshine Health as Preferred Health Insurance Marketplace Provider

Violin15/01/2023 46 Views

The collaboration ensures Community Medical Group patients get continued access to quality, affordable and accessible healthcare coverage through Ambetter from Sunshine Health

MIAMI, Jan. 9, 2023 /PRNewswire/ — Community Medical Group announced today its partnership with Ambetter from Sunshine Health as one of the organization’s preferred insurance providers. This partnership provides Community Medical Group patients in Florida with access to affordable healthcare coverage through Ambetter’s Value Plan.

By choosing the Ambetter Value Plan with Community Medical Group, members receive robust benefits that include:

Comprehensive Medical Care – for coverage on essential medical care and wellness services, such as preventive

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4 min read

Health Insurance

Can You Get Your PHI Back?

Violin15/01/2023 49 Views

If you had concerns about your healthcare data in the hands of your vendors, what do your contracts say in regards to getting that data back?

A recent court case required a healthcare vendor to return data to the healthcare entity.

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CommonSpirit Health hired Emerge Clinical Solutions to process and archive protected health information in 2021.

However, CommonSpirit Health began experiencing issues with the data extracts and was unable to

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3 min read

Health Insurance

Healthcare and Data Tracking – Rickard & Associates

Violin14/01/2023 58 Views

Recently, Facebook’s parent company Meta was fined by the European Union regarding its privacy policies and advertisement targeting.

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The recent decision in the EU may impact how Meta operates in the United States.

The ruling found that Meta violated the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which provides individuals with the right to reject the collection and processing of personal data for advertisement targeting.

Meta plans on appealing to the ruling.

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2 min read

Health Insurance

CPI Inflation Rate Slides As Service Prices Show Progress; S&P 500 Rises

Violin13/01/2023 48 Views

The CPI inflation rate fell faster than expected in December. However, core inflation, which strips out food and energy, only slowed in line with forecasts amid stubborn services inflation. The S&P 500 rose moderately on Thursday’s stock market action after the release of the consumer price index.

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The CPI inflation rate eased to 6.5% from 7.1% the prior month vs. Wall Street expectations of 6.6%. The consumer price index fell 0.1% on the month vs. the expected flat reading.

The core CPI rose 0.3% vs. November levels, as expected. The annual core inflation rate eased to 5.7% from 6%.

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6 min read

Health Insurance

Report: Health Insurance Should Cover Non-Medical Services

Violin13/01/2023 40 Views

Medical care makes up just a fraction of what determines a person’s health, and a new study makes the case that Medicaid in Texas should support non-medical services because of their health impacts and return on investment. While medical experts and public health officials have long been touting the importance of the social determinants of health, the report from Episcopal Health Foundation and the Center for Health Care Strategies provides some hard evidence about why these services should be funded in the Lone Star State.

Healthcare leaders always want issues addressed upstream. Early cancer detection results in better outcomes and

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5 min read

Health Insurance

Reasons Not to Have an Estate Plan

Violin13/01/2023 48 Views

We often hear from clients many reasons why they waited so long to draft their estate plans.

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We often hear the same reasons over and over as to why people don’t have an estate plan or haven’t gotten around to drafting an estate plan.

Some of the most frequent reasons and why they shouldn’t stop you from having an estate plan are:

I don’t have enough money, property, etc. Estate

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4 min read