In late August, I found myself in a small conference room in a sub-regional clinic (SRC) in St. Mary’s, Alaska, a village of 549 Yup’ik residents, listening to Bernadette Charles describe how she is working to meet the village’s oral health needs. Not onl

This blog was originally posted on Say Ahhh! A Children's Health Policy Blog By now many of you have probably heard about the big news coming out of the NAIC meeting this week in Orlando. After seven months of intense debate and negotiation, the NAIC vot

This week brought some important developments in ACA implementation. First and foremost is the major win by consumer advocates in the prolonged and multi-pronged struggle to shape NAIC recommendations on Medical Loss Ratios. At the NAIC meeting in Orlando

In the final showdown at the NAIC meeting, Insurance Commissioners listened to consumer advocates and took a firm stand on medical loss ratios (MLRs). After a furious week of lobbying by both the insurance industry and consumer advocates, the MLR definit

Our sources at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) meeting in sunny Orlando sent an update on the storm brewing over the medical loss ratio (MLR) definition. For those of you new to MLRs, it’s been a long seven months for all of the

Yesterday marked an important victory for health consumers and consumer advocates as the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced nearly $30 million in grants to consumer assistance programs (CAPs) in 35 states, four territories and the Dis

Using public reports from seven drug companies about their payments to doctors, a wide-ranging investigative report by ProPublica revealed this week that tens of thousands of U.S. doctors and health practitioners were paid over $250 million by pharmaceuti

Yesterday, the federal judge in Florida, Roger Vinson, allowed the lawsuit against the new health law to go forward. In his ruling, the Judge maintained that there were constitutional issues in play and formal hearings would begin mid-December. Specifical

This blog was originally posted on Say Ahhhh! A Children's Health Policy Blog. Hard to believe it's come around again but that National Associatin of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) is gearing up for a big national meeting - this time in Orlando, Florida