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Transcript Full Transcript (Adobe Acrobat PDF) Speaker Presentations Cathy Schoen Presentation (PowerPoint) Peter Budetti Presentation (PowerPoint) Chris Koller Presentation (PowerPoint) Mary Wakefield Presentation (PowerPoint)

The American health system is focused on curing, and spends billions of dollars on treatment at the end of life. But now more than 40 million adult Americans suffer with life-altering, chronic health conditions. They and their families are often more concerned with pain management, comfort care, and coordinating care as they transition from setting […]

New initiatives are cropping up in one state after another aimed at helping the uninsured. The most comprehensive efforts have been in Massachusetts, Vermont and Maine. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has attracted national attention for his plan to cover virtually all in that state, and legislative leaders have their own plans. But many other states […]

More than two years after hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf region and destroyed large swaths of New Orleans, local and federal officials are trying to determine the appropriate approach to rebuilding the health care system. Prior to Katrina, Louisiana’s health care infrastructure was a two-tiered system. The middle class relied largely on the private health […]

There is mounting research highlighting poor quality of care and inefficient spending in our health care system. At the same time, diagnostic and treatment options proliferate at an accelerating pace. Faced with these trends, policy makers are searching for ways to help payers, providers and consumers make more informed decisions about coverage and use of […]

Medicare covers nearly 44 million beneficiaries who are elderly, including 37 million seniors and 7 million younger adults with permanent disabilities, and end stage renal disease. The program cost the federal government approximately $375 billion in 2006, accounting for 13 percent of federal spending. Why is Medicare important for congressional staffers to know about? Whom […]

Medicaid is a joint state and federal program. It covers nearly 55 million individuals – children, adults with children, elderly and disabled individuals and cost nearly $300 billion in combined state and federal spending in 2006. Whom does Medicaid serve? What benefits does Medicaid cover? How is it financed? What is the nature of the […]

Providing health insurance coverage to the 46 million Americans without it has been receiving more attention in recent months. Several polls have shown rising public interest in the topic. Coverage is fast becoming an issue in the 2008 presidential campaign, for both Democrats and Republicans. President Bush offered an uninsured proposal in his January State […]

Dollar for dollar, providing better health care for children represents one of the best returns on investment available in the U.S. This involves not only better monitoring of quality and making quality improvements, but also enrolling eligible children in health programs such as SCHIP and Medicaid. And it means ensuring that health care systems – […]

By some estimates, almost three-fourths of America’s nine million uninsured children are eligible for either State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) or Medicaid. As Congress begins debating the reauthorization of the program in earnest, policymakers are examining what is keeping these children from enrolling. Specifically, how successful have state outreach, enrollment and retention efforts proved […]

Authorization for SCHIP expires this September, and, in the coming months, Congress will be debating the program’s extension. Established in 1997 with an authorized 10-year funding level of $40 billion, SCHIP’s accomplishments in providing coverage to an estimated six million children are now widely acknowledged. SCHIP pursues its relatively simple goal – broader coverage for […]

A growing body of evidence shows disparities in quality of care among Medicare beneficiaries of different racial and ethnic backgrounds. These disparities are particularly noteworthy in Medicare, which provides nearly universal access to care to the elderly without regard to race or ethnicity. This suggests that quality of care, and not just access problems, underlie […]