healthcare coverage

> Healthcare industry professionals have had mixed reactions to CMS's Medicare announcements on Tuesday. Report

> IBM is donating 150,000 lines of open-source code to small- and medium-sized practices. The company hopes that it will help these practices afford clinical applications that can operate with larger health information networks. …

San Francisco may soon become the first city to provide healthcare coverage to all its residents. A plan to cover its uninsured residents through the public health system was unanimously approved in preliminary vote. The proposed Health Access Plan, scheduled for a final vote next week, would offer preventive, primary and emergency care by hospitals and clinics in the city. Anyone seeking care would have the option of enrolling in the program and would pay a monthly fee on a sliding scale …

Inspired by the healthcare reform effort in Massachusetts, a number of states are attempting similar free-market approaches to providing healthcare coverage to their uninsured citizens. Lawmakers in New York, Wisconsin and Washington are all weighing similar experiments, The Wall Street Journal reports. Amy Lischko, the commissioner of the Massachusetts Division of Health Care Finance and Policy, tells the paper she has been contacted by officials from at least 12 states. "All of …

> Children's Hospital San Diego continues to try to pick up the pieces after finding out that as many as 200 children may have been molested by a respiratory therapist. Article

> When Congress passed HIPAA in 1996, the goal was to protect patients. Now critics worry that the barriers to the free flow of information that resulted may be hurting both patients and providers. …

After months of harsh criticism, Wal-Mart bowed to popular pressure and said it will offer more generous health care benefits to its workers, including coverage for some part-timers. The company also said it plans to quadruple the number of walk-in healthcare clinics it operates in its stores. CEO H. Lee Scott is scheduled to deliver a speech on Sunday in which he is expected to lay out his company's  healthcare plans to the National Governor's Association. Wal-Mart is the largest …

> Iowa Methodist Medical Center settled a lawsuit involving a former patient who says a surgeon used a Medtronic pacemaker because administrators wanted to win a $1 million payment from the company. Report

> A media frenzy is shaping up after a pair of anesthesiologists scheduled to participate in an execution in California refused to participate, saying they could …

On Thursday, Maryland became the first state in the nation to pass "pay or play" legislation requiring large employers to provide health insurance for their workers. The bill, which passed easily in the Maryland state senate on Thursday, overriding the veto of Gov. Jim Ehrlich, requires employers with more than a set number of employees to spend a percentage of their payroll on healthcare coverage. Similar legislation is in the works in Massachusetts and Illinois.

- see this article from The Washington Post

> Serono Laboratories will pay $700 million to settle charges that it paid kickbacks to doctors to prescribe its AIDS treatment Serostim. Article

> In California, "cross border" insurance, which lets workers receive healthcare far more cheaply in Mexico, is getting an enthusiastic thumbs up from employers. …

Bipartisan support for a plan to expand the Medicaid program to provide healthcare coverage for Katrina appears to be growing in Washington. Several key senators and governors warned on Wednesday they will support legislation sponsored by Senators Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and Max Baucus (D-Mont.), which will extend Medicaid benefits to evacuees from Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. The White House has opposed the legislation, arguing that it could lead to a permanent expansion of the …

The number of Californians without health insurance will grow about 20 percent by 2010 as premiums go up and fewer employers offer coverage, a new study by researchers at UC Berkeley finds. The number of low-wage workers with health insurance dropped from 59 percent to 46 percent between 2000 and 2004. That, the report concludes, could be an ominous omen for the rest of the country. "What we are facing is a downward spiral in healthcare coverage -- and California is five years …