• Why is US health care spending so high? Research suggests the answer is complex.

  July 19, 2018
  

  It has been well documented that U.S. health care spending outpaces other countries, but experts say the reason why could be attributed to the U.S. health system's complexity and resulting administrative costs.

• Another drugmaker just pledged not to raise prices for the rest of 2018

  July 19, 2018
  

  Novartis CEO Vas Narasimhan says Novartis in June voluntarily decided that the company would not increase its U.S. drug prices for the rest of 2018.

• Verma: CMS will keep advancing Medicaid work requirements—despite Kentucky ruling

  July 19, 2018
  

  CMS Administrator Seema Verma says the Trump administration "want[s] to be respectful of" a court ruling blocking Kentucky from implementing Medicaid work requirements, but the administration also "want[s] to push ahead with our policy initiatives and our goals."

• Kaiser's CIO on the rise of telehealth and the internet in health care

  July 19, 2018
  

  Kaiser Permanente Chief Information Officer Dick Daniels recently sat down with the Wall Street Journal to discuss how the health system is utilizing the internet for everything from online appointment scheduling to virtual appointments.

• House panel is looking into quality of care at VA nursing homes

  July 19, 2018
  

  The Boston Globe and USA Today report that House Veterans' Affairs Committee Chair Phil Roe (R-Tenn.) ordered a committee investigation in care at Veterans Affairs nursing homes in response to the publications' report that VA had secretly given nearly half of its nursing homes its lowest-possible quality rating.

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• Trump might stop cost-sharing reduction payments. What would that mean?

  August 7, 2017
  

  President Trump has repeatedly threatened to halt payments that reimburse insurers for reducing out-of-pocket costs for low-income enrollees on the Affordable Care Act's exchanges. Here's what you need to know about the payments and what could happen if Trump halts them.

• Amid uncertainty on health care reform, three insurers announce exchange exits

  August 4, 2017
  

  The insurers say uncertainty surrounding the Affordable Care Act's cost-sharing reduction payments are a reason for their exits from exchange markets in California, Nevada, Utah, Washington, and Wisconsin.

• Insurers attribute proposed 2018 premium increases to ACA uncertainty, KFF finds

  August 10, 2017
  

  Larry Levitt, a senior vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation, says, "In most of the country, the [individual health insurance] market would be stable if not for significant uncertainty about what the ...Trump administration will do."

• US News names 152 'Best Hospitals'

  August 8, 2017
  

  Mayo Clinic tops U.S. News & World Report's "Honor Roll" for the second year in a row.

• ACA repeal has been declared 'dead' countless times. What would really mean it's failed?

  August 1, 2017
  

  The conventional wisdom is that under Senate rules, the GOP's effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act will be officially "dead" if it doesn't pass by the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30. But a former Senate parliamentarian tells American Health Line that things aren't so simple.

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