Health Providers Scramble to Keep Remaining Staff Amid Medicaid Rate Debate

Andrew Johnson lets his clients choose what music to play in the car. As an employee of Family Outreach in Helena, Montana — an organization that assists developmentally disabled people — part of his workday involves driving around, picking up clients, and taking them to work or to run errands. “What’s up, gangsta?” Johnson said …

Read more

Sen. Sanders Shows Fire, but Seeks Modest Goals, in His Debut Drug Hearing as Health Chair

Sen. Bernie Sanders, who rose to national prominence criticizing big business in general and the pharmaceutical industry in particular, claimed the spotlight Wednesday on what might at first seem a powerful new stage from which to advance his agenda: chairmanship of the Senate health committee. But the hearing Sanders used to excoriate a billionaire pharmaceutical …

Read more

The Policy, and Politics, of Medicare Advantage

The Host Medicare Advantage, the private-sector alternative to original Medicare, now enrolls nearly half of all Medicare beneficiaries. But it remains controversial because — while most of its subscribers like the extra benefits many plans provide — the program frequently costs the federal government more than if those seniors remained in the fully public program. …

Read more