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	<title>Health &#38; FamilyCategory: Health Reform &#124; Health &#38; Family &#124; TIME.com</title>
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	<description>A healthy balance of the mind, body and spirit</description>
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		<title>Health &#38; FamilyCategory: Health Reform &#124; Health &#38; Family &#124; TIME.com</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com</link>
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		<title>Diagnostic Errors Are the Most Common Type of Medical Mistake</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2013/04/24/diagnostic-errors-are-more-common-and-harmful-for-patients/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2013/04/24/diagnostic-errors-are-more-common-and-harmful-for-patients/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2013 12:00:55 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alexandra Sifferlin</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Hospitals]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Regulation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Safety]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health care costs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[medical misdiagnosis]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=85032</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[When Dr. David Newman-Toker was a medical resident at a Boston hospital, he witnessed what he calls tragic cases in which otherwise healthy people suffered serious consequences from misdiagnoses that could have been prevented. Newman-Toker, now an associate professor of neurology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, recalls an 18-year-old aspiring Olympic skater who fell on a ski slope and came to the hospital with weakness on one side of her body and a headache. She was told she had a migraine and was sent home. Six days later, she returned to the hospital after a stroke compromised the entire right side of her brain. He also remembers a hardworking janitorial immigrant in her 50s who came in with chest pain. She was seen multiple times at multiple hospitals and everyone missed that her chest pain was caused by compression from her spinal cord. By the time it was recognized, she was a paraplegic. Not every visit to the hospital has a happy ending, and neither does every misdiagnosis lead to severe harm, but Newman-Toker&#8217;s personal experiences motivated him to improve medical misdiagnoses, which he says are not only common, but preventable in most cases. To gain more knowledge about the scope of medical diagnostic errors in the U.S., Newman-Toker and his colleagues reviewed 25 years of medical malpractice claim payouts and reported their findings in the journal BMJ Quality and Safety. (MORE: In-Depth Video: The Exorbitant Prices of Health Care) To make their estimates, the investigators studied medical malpractice payment data from the National Practitioner Data Bank, an electronic collection of all malpractice settlement payments made by practitioners in the U.S. since 1986. They found that diagnostic errors were the most common source of the payments, the most costly and the most dangerous when it came to patients&#8217; health. Such errors, which included diagnoses that were incorrect, wrong or delayed &#8212; were most likely to result in death than other other sources of malpractice suits such as surgical mistakes or medication overdoses. &#8220;People who study diagnostic errors have known for many years that diagnostic<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=85032&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Care</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-care/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/bc8649-001.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">asifferlin</media:title>
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		<item>
		<title>Tips for Lowering Your Medical Bills</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2013/02/20/tips-for-lowering-your-medical-bills/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2013/02/20/tips-for-lowering-your-medical-bills/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 21 Feb 2013 01:39:54 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Hospitals]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health care costs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[lowering health care costs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[medical billing advocates]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[medical bills]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=80538</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It doesn’t happen often, but occasionally you can catch a mistake on a restaurant check or a miscalculated receipt from the grocery store. Hospital bills, however, are another matter: as many as 8 out of 10 bills for health care services contain errors, according to Medical Billing Advocates of America. Since Americans spend nearly $7,000 per capita on health care every year — and since these expenses climb steadily, at an average annual rate of 6.5% — it’s probably worth scrutinizing the remittance from your last hospital visit. It just might save you hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars. (FULL COVERAGE: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us) According to medical-billing advocates, who are the health care world’s equivalent of tax-refund specialists, there are ways to protect yourself from huge health care expenditures both before you’re seen by a doctor and after you receive your bill. “When you are in the hospital, you should concentrate on getting better,” says Kevin Flynn, president of HealthCare Associations, a company that helps patients decipher their medical bills. “Do what is best medically first, then worry about the finances second.” At the emergency room or in the hospital: If you are insured, ask to be seen by a doctor who participates in your insurance plan. Just because a hospital is considered in-network by your plan doesn’t mean that all the physicians who work there are as well. This may not always be possible, but if your preference is noted in your file, once you receive your bill, you may be able to negotiate with the hospital to accept your insurer’s higher in-network reimbursement rate, leaving you with a smaller financial responsibility, even if you are seen by an out-of-network doctor. For the same reason, if you are able to, ask to have any lab testing that is sent outside the hospital to be sent to facilities that participate in your insurer’s plan. If possible, ask about the tests the doctor or nurses are ordering. If a less expensive test can provide the same information, then request that option. In<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=80538&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2013/02/20/tips-for-lowering-your-medical-bills/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/21medicalbills1.gif?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">21medicalbills</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">apark7</media:title>
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		<title>The Kindest Cut: How One Hospital Lowered Costs by Making Doctors More Budget Conscious</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2013/02/20/the-kindest-cut-how-one-hospital-lowered-costs-by-making-doctors-more-budget-conscious/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2013/02/20/the-kindest-cut-how-one-hospital-lowered-costs-by-making-doctors-more-budget-conscious/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 21 Feb 2013 01:38:41 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Dr. Toby Cosgrove</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Viewpoint]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=80461</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Give a surgeon the choice between a $5 silk stitch and a $400 staple to close up an incision, and he’ll choose the $5 stitch, right? Not necessarily. The problem is, most surgeons never know that the stitch costs $5 and the staple costs $400. Traditionally, knowing the costs of a stitch or a catheter or a bone screw — or any of the thousands of other supplies used during surgeries — hasn’t been part of many doctors’ medical consciousness. Health care costs, however, have grown too massive — topping $2 trillion a year – to continue doing things the way we’ve always done them. Conscientious medical providers have no choice but to confront cost issues or become guilty bystanders to the slow deterioration of America’s health care system. (MORE: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us) Meaningful change, however, can only come with knowledge. Believe it or not, most hospitals don’t know what it costs them to perform common procedures like removing a prostate. But at the Cleveland Clinic, we’ve made it a point to know, asking our physicians to deconstruct the costs of their top three procedures — to record the price of sutures, count how many instruments were on the table, tag the devices on the shelf and record how long patients spent in post-anesthesia care. Once the details are in, it’s easy to see where to cut costs. Three years ago, we challenged ourselves to save $100 million by focusing on how and what we buy to stock the hospital with needed equipment and supplies. The key was to meaningfully engage doctors. Now, as part of the purchasing process, dozens of doctors gather to discuss the merits of certain products: Which ones provide the best outcomes for patients? How many are needed? How much does it cost? (MORE: Least Healthy Employees? Hospital Workers) Take, for example, nitric oxide, a drug commonly used in heart, lung and chest surgeries to keep tissues well-supplied with oxygen during the operation. When it&#8217;s effective, it&#8217;s very effective, but it doesn&#8217;t help all<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=80461&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/31doctorbill1.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Medical Cost</media:title>
		</media:content>

		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/69fc92d1c4598c5b98d03fde16cdfa74?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">apark7</media:title>
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		<title>How Keeping Psych Records Too Private Can Hurt Patient Care</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2013/01/07/how-keeping-psych-records-too-private-can-hurt-patient-care/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2013/01/07/how-keeping-psych-records-too-private-can-hurt-patient-care/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 07 Jan 2013 19:56:54 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Maia Szalavitz</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mental Health]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mental Illness]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[data sharing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[electronic health records]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[electronic medical records]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hospitals]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[medical records]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mental illness]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[psychiatric records]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[psychiatric treatment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[psychiatry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[serious mental illness]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=77329</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The latest research suggests that preventing psychiatrists from sharing their patients’ records with their other doctors may actually do more harm than good. Some of the most sensitive information in medicine involves mental health care, including the diagnoses, drugs and notes that psychiatrists include in their patients&#8217; health records. The files can include anything from dosage of medications to people&#8217;s deepest fears and their most bizarre fantasies. So both regulators and health care professionals go to great lengths to keep such records private and for certain eyes only. But in a study published in the International Journal of Medical Informatics, researchers found that hospitals that both use electronic psychiatric records and allow them to be shared with other doctors have a 32% to 39% lower rate of readmission within a month of patient discharge for mental illnesses. (MORE: Can Patients Handle the Truth? Getting Access to Doctors&#8217; Notes) “Those hospitals that actually coordinate care between psychiatrist and nonpsychiatrist physicians, presumably through electronic records, had better outcomes,” says lead author Dr. Adam Kaplin, assistant professor of psychiatry and neurology at Johns Hopkins. “I thought it was an interesting study, and it fills a void in terms of information” about these outcomes, says Dr. Norman Clemens, a psychiatrist in private practice who has studied privacy issues in psychiatry but is not associated with the new research. Kaplin and his colleagues analyzed data from 13 of the 18 hospitals listed by U.S. News &#38; World Report as the best in America. They found that less than half (44%) of these top hospitals used electronic records for psychiatric care, and only 28% allowed physicians in other specialties to look at the psych records of the patients they were treating. A mere 22% did both, which meant that only this group had rapid access to the information through computerized records. (MORE: Are Electronic Health Systems Cost-Effective? Not So Much) The study was prompted by Kaplin’s personal experience with the detrimental effects of these barriers. When his neurology colleagues wanted to consult his psychiatric records, it<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=77329&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2013/01/07/how-keeping-psych-records-too-private-can-hurt-patient-care/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Mental Illness</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/mental-health/mental-illness-mental-health/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/155291847a.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">155291847a</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">MaiaSzalavitz</media:title>
		</media:content>
	</item>
		<item>
		<title>The 8 Preventive Health Services that Women Start Getting Free Today</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2012/08/01/the-8-preventive-health-services-that-women-start-getting-free-today/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2012/08/01/the-8-preventive-health-services-that-women-start-getting-free-today/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 01 Aug 2012 18:15:58 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alexandra Sifferlin</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Insurance]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Prevention]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Women's Health]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[affordable care act]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[preventive care]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=65318</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Starting today, about 47 million American women will have access to free preventive health services as part of a new provision in President Obama&#8217;s Affordable Care Act. Comprehensive preventive care coverage will now be provided for insured women enrolling in new health care plans or renewing their existing policies on or after Aug. 1, 2012. Here&#8217;s the breakdown, courtesy of the Dept. of Health and Human Services, of the eight services women are now eligible to receive under the new provision without a copay or any cost sharing: Well-woman visits: This includes an annual well-woman preventive care visit for adult women to obtain the recommended preventive services, plus additional visits if women and their doctors determine they&#8217;re necessary. Gestational diabetes screening: This screening is for women 24 to 28 weeks pregnant, and those at high risk of developing gestational diabetes. Women who have gestational diabetes have an increased risk of developing Type 2 diabetes in the future, and their children are at a significantly increased risk of being overweight and insulin-resistant throughout childhood. HPV DNA testing: Women who are 30 or older will now have access to high-risk human papillomavirus (HPV) DNA testing every three years, regardless of Pap smear results. Early screening, detection and treatment have been shown to help reduce the prevalence of cervical cancer. STI counseling: Sexually active women may receive annual counseling on sexually transmitted infections (STIs). The sessions have been shown to reduce risky behavior in patients, but only 28% of women aged 18 to 44 discuss STIs with a doctor or nurse. HIV screening and counseling: Sexually active women can receive annual counseling on HIV. Women are at increased risk of becoming infected with HIV: from 1999 to 2003, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported a 15% increase in AIDS cases among women, and a 1% increase among men. Contraception and contraceptive counseling: Women will have free access to all government-approved contraceptive methods, sterilization procedures and patient education and counseling. This does not include abortion drugs. Most workers in employer-sponsored plans are currently covered for contraceptives; however, employers<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=65318&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Care</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-care/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/200146015-001.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">birth control pills</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">asifferlin</media:title>
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		<title>Should Medicaid Be Expanded? Study Finds It May Lower Death Rates</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2012/07/26/should-medicaid-be-expanded-study-finds-it-may-lower-death-rates/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2012/07/26/should-medicaid-be-expanded-study-finds-it-may-lower-death-rates/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 26 Jul 2012 18:30:19 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alexandra Sifferlin</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Insurance]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicare & Medicaid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[affordable care act]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[medicaid]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=64781</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[As states debate whether to expand their Medicaid coverage under President Obama&#8217;s Affordable Care Act, a new study by Harvard School of Public Health researchers finds that doing so may save thousands of lives. The study compared health statistics in three states that recently expanded their Medicaid programs — Arizona, Maine and New York — with neighboring states that did not and found that when health insurance was extended to more low-income residents, death rates dropped by about 6%. Currently, Medicaid, a federal-state program for poor or severely disabled people, covers about 60 million Americans. Under the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid eligibility will extend to millions more Americans — perhaps half of the 30 million who are now uninsured — starting in 2014. Last month, the Supreme Court ruling on the health care law gave states the option to accept or reject the law&#8217;s Medicaid expansion, intended to grant coverage to uninsured adults without children and with annual incomes of about $15,400. Most states are expected to extend their coverage to some degree. (MORE: Brief History: Secret Medical Testing) The debate over Medicaid expansion has largely centered around cost and states&#8217; rights. For the first three years of expansion under the new health care law, the federal government will pick up the tab, then scale back to give states more of the financial responsibility. Some critics argue that the costs aren&#8217;t justified because coverage under the program doesn&#8217;t lead to better health; they contend that because Medicaid pays doctors less than Medicare or private insurance, patients may not get the care they need. Enter the new study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, which seeks to answer that very question. The study looked at three states that had expanded their Medicaid programs between 2000 and 2005 to cover low-income adults without kids or disabilities, a population that was previously ineligible for Medicaid. The researchers compared mortality rates in these three states five years before and after the expansions. They then compared the rates to four neighboring states that did not<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=64781&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Medicare &amp; Medicaid</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/medicare-medicaid/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/1141469951.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">114146995</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">asifferlin</media:title>
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		<title>The Health Care Decision: Winners and Losers</title>
		<link>http://swampland.time.com/2012/06/28/supreme-court-upholds-obamacare-in-landmark-decision/</link>
		<comments>http://swampland.time.com/2012/06/28/supreme-court-upholds-obamacare-in-landmark-decision/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 28 Jun 2012 22:00:22 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Healthland Staff</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=63014</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[In a landmark decision on Thursday, the Supreme Court upheld President Obama’s sweeping health reform law. So who wins and who loses in the aftermath of the vote? Check out our companion blog Swampland to find out.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=63014&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://swampland.time.com/2012/06/28/supreme-court-upholds-obamacare-in-landmark-decision/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">healthlandstaff</media:title>
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		<title>Why the Supreme Court&#8217;s Health Care Decision Is Taking So Long</title>
		<link>http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/06/26/why-the-supreme-court-left-us-hanging-on-healthcare/</link>
		<comments>http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/06/26/why-the-supreme-court-left-us-hanging-on-healthcare/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 26 Jun 2012 16:30:55 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>TIME Staff</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[healthcare]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Obama Administration’s Affordable Care Act]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[SCOTUS]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=62811</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[After weeks of high expectation, the Supreme Court delayed the announcement of its ruling on the Obama Administration’s Affordable Care Act until Thursday. Find out more about why the justices are keeping us waiting, over on our companion blog NewsFeed.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=62811&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/06/26/why-the-supreme-court-left-us-hanging-on-healthcare/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/ca03144.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">CA03144</media:title>
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		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/3cb61b88047e46fa55ea7dd6bf87ec1c?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">timeadmin</media:title>
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		<title>&#8216;Personhood&#8217;: How Mississippi&#8217;s Proposal Could Affect Everything from Abortion to the Drinking Age</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2011/11/08/personhood-how-mississippis-proposal-could-affect-everything-from-abortion-to-the-drinking-age-2/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2011/11/08/personhood-how-mississippis-proposal-could-affect-everything-from-abortion-to-the-drinking-age-2/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 08 Nov 2011 21:05:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Maia Szalavitz</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[abortion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[amendment]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Baby]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[embryo]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[IVF]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Mississippi]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[person]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[personhood]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Proposition 26]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=46718</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Mississippi voters are deciding today on whether a fertilized egg should be legally considered a “person.” They&#8217;ll be choosing to reject or support Initiative 26, which was until weeks ago expected to pass easily but is now too close to call. If passed, the “personhood” amendment has incredibly wide-ranging implications, not only for abortion rights but also for fertility treatment, birth control, women’s medical care and even potentially seemingly unrelated issues like the drinking age and voting.  It will likely face an immediate constitutional challenge.  Although attempts to pass such a bill in Colorado have already failed twice, supporters of Personhood USA hope to get similar legislation on the ballots of half of all states by 2012, according to NPR. But the potential for such a law to cause widespread legal and medical havoc has even some strongly anti-abortion leaders (like Mississippi&#8217;s Catholic and Episcopal bishops) sitting out the debate or actually opposing the amendment.  Here are some of the issues that a personhood law could affect. Next: Abortion<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=46718&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2011/11/08/personhood-how-mississippis-proposal-could-affect-everything-from-abortion-to-the-drinking-age-2/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/image-81.jpeg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">Mississippi&#039;s Amendment</media:title>
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		<media:content url="http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/0a5ac57e99124922fa628492ad3db6b2?s=96&#38;d=http%3A%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&#38;r=G" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">MaiaSzalavitz</media:title>
		</media:content>

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		<title>Money Isn&#8217;t Everything, Even to Doctors</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/26/money-isnt-everything-even-to-doctors/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/26/money-isnt-everything-even-to-doctors/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 26 Jan 2011 16:45:35 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Kate Pickert</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[affordable care act]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[doctors]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[financial incentives]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Harvard study]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Pay-For-Performance]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=23706</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Many health policy experts, including those who wrote the Affordable Care Act, believe there’s only one thing that can get doctors to change their behavior — money. A new study may blow a giant hole in that belief, just in time to save the government millions or even billions of dollars. “Pay-For-Performance” is the theory that health care wonks believe could bring the U.S. health care system back from the financial brink. Pay for quality; compensate for competency. If we can just reward doctors when their patients stay or get healthy, we can solve a lot of what ails us systemically. Healthier patients are less expensive to care for and place less strain on the medical system. If doctors are incentivized to keep their patients from getting sick (or sicker), staggering amounts of money and time could be saved. At least that’s the theory behind some of the most experimental and innovative provisions in the new health reform law. (More on TIME.com: In Rural Areas, There May Be No Doctors to Tend to Your Sick Kid) Right now, doctors don’t get paid this way. For the most part, the government (via Medicare or Medicaid) or private insurance companies pay physicians for each individual task they perform. There are no penalties or rewards if these doctors choose the wrong treatments or if a patient’s chronic disease isn’t well managed. The more treatments, surgeries, or office visits a doctor performs, the more money he or she makes. A few years ago, the United Kingdom, in a preview of how the U.S. system could be transformed under health care reform, thought it had a way to improve quality. (Doctors who work for the NHS, a single payer system, are paid differently than in the U.S., largely via salary, but the experiment is still applicable.) Beginning in 2004, the country’s National Health Service (NHS) committed more than $3 billion toward a program to pay doctors bonuses of as much as 25% of their total income. All they had to do was meet or exceed<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=23706&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/26/money-isnt-everything-even-to-doctors/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/107070769-surgeon-writing.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">107070769 surgeon writing</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">katepickert</media:title>
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		<title>Are Electronic Health Systems Cost Effective? Not So Much</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/19/are-electronic-health-systems-cost-effective-not-so-much/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/19/are-electronic-health-systems-cost-effective-not-so-much/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 19 Jan 2011 17:30:20 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Alice Park</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[digital health]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ehealth]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[electronic health records]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[electronic prescriptions]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=23017</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[If you’ve visited the doctor or a hospital recently, you can’t help but notice how much of your care depends on some form of electronic information exchange. From the prescription your doctor writes to the chart she consults, medicine is very definitely going digital. But how effective is all this electronic data capture? Is it making the health care system more efficient? And what about patient care — are e-health technologies improving health outcomes for people who are sick? (More on Time.com: The Top 10 Medical Breakthroughs of 2010) Unfortunately, the answer is no, according to research published in PLoS Medicine. And this is despite the billions that governments like the U.S. have poured into such technologies — the Obama administration approved $38 billion to digitize the American health care system. After analyzing 53 reviews of electronic technologies in health care, researchers led by Dr. Aziz Sheikh at the University of Edinburgh report that there is little or weak evidence to support the massive investment that policy makers have made in electronic systems such as electronic health records and computerizing physician orders and other decision-making. The strongest evidence in support of digitizing medical information came in electronic prescriptions, which showed a small benefit in reducing errors and streamlining ordering. “The results didn’t come as a complete surprise,” says Sheikh. “Early on in the analysis, it became quite clear there was a gulf between the investment being made and the claims made about what was actually being realized in terms of patient outcomes.” The reason, he says, has a lot to do with the politics of health policy making. “In many countries now, technology-driven programs are quite politically motivated,” he says. (More on Time.com: 5 Ways to Get the Most Out of Health Reform) That doesn’t mean that technology can’t benefit patients and improve health care. Sheikh says that the most impressive changes due to e-health interventions emerged in hospitals and health centers where the technology was embraced and customized to optimize performance of health care personnel and maximize the delivery<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=23017&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/19/are-electronic-health-systems-cost-effective-not-so-much/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/78393259ehealth1-18-11crop.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">apark7</media:title>
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		<title>5 Ways to Get the Most Out of Health Reform</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/03/5-ways-to-get-the-most-out-of-health-reform/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/03/5-ways-to-get-the-most-out-of-health-reform/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 03 Jan 2011 11:36:14 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Kate Pickert</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[2011]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[affordable care act]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Guide to Life 2011]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health care tipsheet]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=21232</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Still not clear on the ins and outs of the Affordable Care Act? Here&#8217;s an easy tipsheet to help you get the most benefit out of health reform in 2011.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=21232&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2011/01/03/5-ways-to-get-the-most-out-of-health-reform/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/307_checkup.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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		<media:content url="http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/307_checkup.jpg?w=240" medium="image">
			<media:title type="html">Get a Checkup</media:title>
		</media:content>

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			<media:title type="html">katepickert</media:title>
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		<title>Confused About Health Reform? Help Is Here</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2010/09/22/confused-about-health-reform-help-is-here/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2010/09/22/confused-about-health-reform-help-is-here/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 22 Sep 2010 11:45:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Kate Pickert</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[affordable care act]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kaiser]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=9603</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[On the whole, Americans don’t understand the Affordable Care Act (ACA) very well. After the jump, some proof of the confusion, as well as a helpful — and adorable — video tutorial that might help clear some things up. The Associated Press released a poll Tuesday confirming what other pollsters have found — Americans are utterly confounded when it comes to the ACA. According to the AP survey: *41% of people don’t think the law will require U.S. citizens to have health insurance or pay a fine. (Actually, the law will do this with what’s known as the “individual mandate.”) * 41% of people don’t think the law will have the government give money to low-income citizens to help them buy insurance. (This is a central tenet of the new law.) (More on Time.com: Meet the Man Behind Health Care Reform) * 40% believe the law will require Americans to provide a government ID card to get care at hospitals. (This is false.) * 39% believe committees will review individual medical histories to decide if they can get care paid for by the government. (This is false.) * 65% believe the law will increase the federal deficit. (It will reduce the deficit by more than $100 billion over 10 years.) There are lot more interesting survey questions and answers in the full poll results available here. If you are confused about the new law, you are not alone. In fact, generally, you’re in the majority. But fear not. The Kaiser Family Foundation, a non-partisan non-profit group, just produced a cartoon video that does an amazingly thorough job of explaining what’s wrong the U.S. health care system and how the ACA attempts to solve those problems. The best part — it’s only 9 minutes long! And it’s cute. And it’s narrated by Cokie Roberts. Enjoy! More on Time.com: Five Immediate Benefits of Health Reform The Five Keys to Health Reform&#8217;s Success or Failure<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=9603&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2010/09/22/confused-about-health-reform-help-is-here/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link><featured_image>http://timewellness.files.wordpress.com/2010/09/confused-102483988.jpg?w=240</featured_image>
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			<media:title type="html">confused - 102483988</media:title>
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			<media:title type="html">katepickert</media:title>
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		<title>Meet the Man Behind Health Care Reform</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2010/09/13/the-man-behind-health-care-reform/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2010/09/13/the-man-behind-health-care-reform/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 13 Sep 2010 17:30:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Kate Pickert</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[affordable care act]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[berwick]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cms]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[medicaid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Medicare]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://healthland.time.com/?p=8029</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[If you&#8217;ve heard of Donald Berwick, the new chief of Medicare and Medicaid, chances are good that what you&#8217;ve heard has been pretty scary. Charges levels by Republicans critical of the new Affordable Care Act (ACA) include: He wants to create a British-style health care in the U.S.! He wants to ration care! He has secret ambitions to sacrifice health to save money! Stepping back from the hyperbolic — and largely inaccurate — criticisms leveled at Berwick so far, I take a look today at what he has said and written over the years to get some insight on how he might approach his new job. Berwick&#8217;s new gig, by the way, is probably the most critical one in U.S. health care and includes managing a budget larger than the Pentagon&#8217;s, providing health insurance for more than 100 million Americans, and guiding implementation of the (ACA). For perspective on how the new sweeping law will affect how health care happens in the U.S., check out my story about Berwick on Time.com today.<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=8029&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">katepickert</media:title>
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		<title>Does Prevention Really Cut Health-Care Costs?</title>
		<link>http://healthland.time.com/2009/08/04/does-prevention-really-cut-health-care-costs/</link>
		<comments>http://healthland.time.com/2009/08/04/does-prevention-really-cut-health-care-costs/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 04 Aug 2009 11:13:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Laura Blue</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Health Reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Policy & Industry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Health Care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health care reform]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Prevention]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://wellness.blogs.time.com/?p=123</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[If you&#8217;ve been trying to follow the debate over U.S. health-care reform, you might be confused about whether Obama&#8217;s plan is really going to cut costs, how much it will save, and how on earth there can be so much debate over what seems like accounting. At the heart of this issue, however, is the question of prevention: Can prevention really cut health-care costs? At first blush the answer seems obvious. If I don&#8217;t need a new heart stent, then no one has to pay for it. But the question becomes more slippery when you start to look at life-time health costs. We&#8217;re all going to die eventually — there&#8217;s no preventing that — and that means it&#8217;s hard to prevent the period of very poor health that comes right before death — a period which tends to be very, very expensive. In 1997, a group of scientists at Erasmus University in Holland famously showed that smokers have lower total life-time health-care expenditures than non-smokers. Smokers do cost a lot more per year of life, but because their lives are so much shorter on average, the non-smokers end up with higher costs in the long run. Recently people have started to make a similar argument about obesity: that overweight people will cost less overall because they don&#8217;t live so long. I have yet to be convinced of this. Obesity causes all kinds of expensive disability, driving up costs per year of life, while in fact the link between excess weight and early death is surprisingly weak. But the point here is that it&#8217;s not impossible for prevention — prolonging life, and even prolonging healthy life — to lead to higher health-care costs overall. So does prevention cut costs? It turns out that the answer really can depend on how you&#8217;re counting. The authors of the 1997 paper about smokers&#8217; health found that eliminating smoking would have cut costs in the short run — for about 15 years — even as long-run expenditures increased because people were living longer. Similarly, if we&#8217;re willing to assume for minute (and I&#8217;ll suspend my disbelief) that obesity, like smoking, actually cuts a person&#8217;s life-time health costs because it cuts<img alt="" border="0" src="http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=healthland.time.com&#038;blog=8684427&#038;post=123&#038;subd=timewellness&#038;ref=&#038;feed=1" width="1" height="1" />]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://healthland.time.com/2009/08/04/does-prevention-really-cut-health-care-costs/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
	<primary_category>Health Reform</primary_category><primary_category_link>http://healthland.time.com/category/policy-industry/health-reform/</primary_category_link>
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			<media:title type="html">Laura Blue</media:title>
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