Insurers Object to New Provision in Medicare Law

Insurers Object to New Provision in Medicare Law
By ROBERT PEAR

Published: August 22, 2004


WASHINGTON, Aug. 20 - A major obstacle to the success of the new Medicare law has emerged in recent weeks: private insurers have told the Bush administration that they will not expand their role in Medicare if they have to serve large multistate regions, as the White House wants.

Congress sharply increased payments to private health plans last year in the hope that they would serve many more Medicare beneficiaries.

But the Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans, the backbone of the nation's private health insurance system, and other insurers said it was not feasible for them to establish networks of doctors and hospitals spanning large regions like New England or the Midwest.

They want the government to designate 50 regions, one for each state. That is the preference stated emphatically, in separate letters to the Bush administration, by the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association and by America's Health Insurance Plans, the chief lobby for the health insurance industry.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/22/politics/22medicare.html?hp
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Did BushCo really not bother to get their input before passing their stupid bill? Genius.

I would have thought Bush had them write the damn bill in the first place. That's the usual routine isn't it? When you want to enact legislation related to an industry, you invite the moneymen from the industry over to write the legislation, with the understanding that they leave without the bags of cash.

M.Moore claims none of them are ever read clear through...so WHO WRITES THEM THEN??? The interns?

Ever notice that; on the house and senate floors they bring out reams and stacks of papers/bills for this or that........... it would take a month to read any individual one of them, but WHO WRITES THEM?

It's very curious indeed.

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http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/newfreedom/chapter4-2004.html
1) Americans understand that mental health is essential to overall health;
2) mental health care is consumer and family-driven;
3) disparities in mental health services are eliminated;
4) early mental health screening, assessment, and referral to services are common practice;
5) excellent mental health services are delivered and research is accelerated; and
6) technology is used to access mental health care and information.
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"Every adult with a serious mental illness or child with a serious emotional disturbance must have an individualized plan of care coordinating services among programs and across agencies. Every state must have a comprehensive mental health plan, the ownership of which is shared by all state agencies impacting the care of persons with serious mental illnesses."
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"The Department of Health and Human Services’ Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will release a technical assistance guide on six evidence-based practices (family psycho-education, integrated care of co-occurring disorders, personal illness management, supported employment, assertive community treatment, and medication management). The guide will clarify what services are billable under Medicaid.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services are working with the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and constituent representatives to configure how a consumer self-direction initiative can address persons with mental disorders, as part of a series of planning meetings resulting in action steps.
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I keep seeing the "ownership" buzzword in the above. According to the above, medical records will be owned by all "state" agencies involved in "caring for" the ill person. Notably absent is that there's no mention of whether the patient, or "the consumer", is also an owner of their own records.

It appears that the state ownership for medical records has been well planned. From today's article it further appears this plan is for ownership to be in "private" corporations hands, not "state" care, unless "the state" is now "the corporation".

How this relates to the issue of multi-state regions is unclear.