Anthony Wallace, Author at The Hertel Report

Anthony Wallace

Freelance Writer and student at Arizona State University - Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, Master of Mass Communication - Health Journalism

Author's Posts

National News

Healthcare Spending Drivers & Insurers' Financial Health, MLRs During COVID

In the United States - which leads the world in COVID-19 deaths - the pandemic is altering the healthcare landscape. National Association of Insurance Commissioners, Mark Farrah Associates and Kaiser Family Foundation recently collaborated...

Arizona News

A Look at Life Without the ACA: Insurance Rates, Coverage Disparities and Pre-Existing Conditions

As the Affordable Care Act looks to go before a decidedly different Supreme Court, people across the country are grappling with the ripple effects of the law's potential demise. While the elimination of the ACA would likely impact the vast majority of Americans in some way, it would hurt some more than others. According to an...

National News

RGB, Barrett & The Fate of the ACA

Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death comes just weeks before the Supreme Court is set to hear another case to decide the fate of the Affordable Care Act, casting doubt on its future. A little over a week after Ginsburg's death, President Trump nominated Judge Amy Coney Barrett as her replacement. It didn't take long before the...

Arizona News

COVID-19 Hit Exposes Weakness in Banner Health's Thin Staffing Strategy

As the dust settles on the state’s first-wave peak, its impact on the hospital system which absorbed the bulk of Arizona's COVID-19 hit has come into focus. Banner Health, which cared for about half of Arizonans hospitalized with COVID-19 at the pandemics peak here in July, struggled to staff hospitals as cases surged. The...

Arizona News

New Study Finds US Internist Residency Programs Lack Effective Health Disparities Training

As the pandemic continues to disproportionately ravage certain segments of the American population, a newly published analysis of large-scale survey data found only 40% of internal medicine residency programs’ curricula featured training on health disparities. The 2015 survey results are timely as the COVID-19 pandemic has...

Arizona News

Federal Judge Fines Arizona Urgent Care $12.5 Million For Filing False Claims

An Arizona company behind a chain of urgent care clinics owes $12.5 million in restitution after swindling insurance companies by deceiving patients and overbilling insurers. Between 2012 and 2016, UCXtra Umbrella, LLC, branded as Urgent Care Extra, operated over 30 clinics mostly in Phoenix and Tucson. The clinics’ deployed a...

Arizona News

Pharmacists Playing Key Role in Increasing COVID-19 Testing

Arizona is working to step up its COVID-19 testing game. But as the state makes more tests available, professionals are needed to administer them -- and pharmacists are answering the call. Traditionally, pharmacists cannot be reimbursed by Medicare for services, but CMS relaxed those regulations in response to the pandemic. On...

Arizona News

Arizona Nursing Homes Fight COVID: Grim Numbers, Opaque Reporting

Facilities that care and house large numbers of elderly folks are being ravaged by COVID-19 - an incredibly contagious virus particularly deadly for older people. Just 6.7% of Americans are over 75-years-old, but that population accounts for nearly 60% of the country’s COVID deaths. According to the Maricopa County...

National News

COVID-19 Spurs Flurry of MA Changes While Disenrollment Fears Emerge

COVID-19 has rapidly changed the way healthcare looks in America, and Medicare Advantage is caught in the heart of the storm. According to Kaiser Family Foundation, enrollment in MA plans more than doubled in the last decade, from 11.1 to 24.1 million. But now, the pandemic poses a particular threat to MA’s beneficiaries,...

National News

CMS Scales Back Recently Expanded Medicare Advance Payment Program

Last week, CMS announced it is adjusting payouts from its Accelerated Payment Program (AAP) which was recently expanded to help healthcare providers and suppliers address COVID-19 related costs. In a press release, CMS detailed that Medicare payments to Part B suppliers were immediately cut off, while the agency is...

Arizona News

COVID-19 Fuels Rapid Adoption of Telehealth Technology

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the face of healthcare as we know it. As in-person visits become in many cases impossible, the role of telemedicine has become essential. In Arizona and elsewhere, healthcare providers are turning to technology to deliver care at a distance like never before. Dr. Ateev Mehrotra, an...

Arizona News

SNFs Struggle to Subsist through COVID-19

The coronavirus outbreak has profoundly impacted the facilities who care for those most vulnerable to it: nursing homes and skilled nursing facilities (SNF). This week, AZCentral reported that SNF residents currently account for nearly half of Maricopa and Pima Counties’ COVID-19 deaths. According to a Maricopa County...

Arizona News

Telemedicine Booms In COVID-19 Crisis - A Look at Local & National Resources

The coronavirus pandemic poses a myriad of problems for healthcare entities across the country and many see telemedicine as a solution to some of them. Providers have been gradually implementing telemedicine services slowly for years. But as the need for separation between people has become suddenly paramount, the pace of its...

National News

10 Eventful Years of the Affordable Care Act

As the Affordable Care Act turns 10 years old, the country looks back on its successes and controversies -- and looks forward to its uncertain future. One thing most can agree on: it has transformed healthcare in America. Matt Eyles, the CEO of the lobbying group America’s Health Insurance Plans, spoke with FierceHealthcare...

Arizona News

Arizona's Small Healthcare Businesses Dealing with Whirlwind of Changes in COVID-19 Outbreak

The coronavirus outbreak is putting unprecedented strain on local and national economies across the world, and Arizona’s healthcare-centric small businesses are feeling the effects. Even as money is poured into the healthcare sector to fight the virus, many corners of the industry are hurting. The healthcare landscape has...

Arizona News

Arizona Hospitals Face Impending Bed Shortages for COVID-19 Patients

As Arizona braces for an escalation of the COVID-19 outbreak, Banner Health and other hospitals are reckoning with the possibility of significant resource shortages. A side by side comparison of Arizona hospital beds and CDC projections paints a dire picture. On Monday, Holly Ward of the Arizona Hospital and Healthcare...

Arizona News

US Nurses Fear Hospitals Aren’t Ready for Coronavirus

As American hospitals stare down the coronavirus, health care workers worry about their employers’ preparedness and their own personal safety. The global coronavirus threat escalated last week as cases soared and spread to new countries, the CDC announced its inevitable proliferation into the US, and financial markets crashed...

Arizona News

New CMS Model Pays For Non-Hospital-Bound Ambulance Rides

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is rolling out a new “Emergency Triage, Treat, and Transport” (ET3) model designed to cut costs and increase flexibility for ambulance care teams treating Medicare Fee-for-Service (FFS) beneficiaries. Last week, they announced the 205 ambulance operators in 36 states...

National News

Study in Lancet Predicts Medicare for All Would Save Lives and Money

The study, published earlier this month in The Lancet, provides some scientific scaffolding for the ambitious healthcare overhaul central to Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaigns. It predicts Medicare for All (M4A) would save the country 13% or $450 billion in health care expenditures each year and save 68,000...

National News

CMS Looks to Extend Medicare’s Joint Replacement Bundled Payment Model

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) proposed to extend the Comprehensive Care for Joint Replacement (CJR) model for an additional three years. Currently set to expire at the end of this year, the proposal would extend the Medicare bundled payment model until Dec. 2023. It provides participating providers with a fixed...

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