Chiropractic Breakthrough

The Republican-led House, defying a veto threat from the White House, voted 215-195 yesterday to extend the current 3.4 percent interest rate on government student loans that is set to double on July 1.

A House panel on Wednesday approved a budget reconciliation measure that would cap certain damages in medical malpractice lawsuits, limit attorneys’ fees and establish a statute of limitations for filing health care cases. The Judiciary Committee approved 16-14 the draft bill, which would cut federal spending by $39.7 billion over 10 years.

Hospital patients waiting in an emergency room or convalescing after surgery are being confronted by an unexpected visitor: a debt collector at bedside. This and other aggressive tactics by one of the nation’s largest collectors of medical debts, Accretive Health, were revealed on Tuesday by the Minnesota attorney general, raising concerns that such practices have become common at hospitals across the country.

Medicare, which is expected to provide health insurance to more than 50 million elderly and disabled Americans this year, is expected to start operating in the red in its largest fund in 2024, according to the annual assessment by the trustees charged with overseeing the programs.

HCR Update from Mark Sanna: The American College of Physicians is urging patients with newly diagnosed diabetes and back pain not to opt for the latest-and-supposedly-greatest. It’s part of a new campaign to steer patients (and their doctors) to what the College of Physicians calls “high value care,” and away from expensive tests and treatments that aren’t any better — and often are worse.

About 2.5 million young adults from age 19 to 25 attained health coverage as a result of the Affordable Care Act . The Supreme Court could decide to scrap the entire law — instead of just the mandate — leaving millions of young adults in the lurch.

This week, Medicare agreed to settle a dispute with about 2,200 hospitals nationwide over a decade-long error in reimbursement rates, offering what could amount to a $3-billion infusion to hospitals already bracing for funding cuts under the federal healthcare law.

The Texas Medical Board on Friday approved controversial new rules on the use of adult stem cells, raising concerns that Texans could receive therapies that have not yet been proven to work and that could be unsafe.

Spurred by patients and patient advocates, lawmakers in at least 20 states, from Maine to Hawaii, have introduced bills that would limit out-of-pocket payments by consumers for expensive drugs used to treat diseases like cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis and inherited disorders.

President Obama’s landmark health-care initiative, long touted as a means to control costs, will actually add more than $340 billion to the nation’s budget woes over the next decade, according to a new study by a Republican member of the board that oversees Medicare financing.