Melanie MacEachern, Author at The Hertel Report

Melanie MacEachern

Freelance writer with skills and knowledge in healthcare policy, reproductive justice and art history. Skilled administrative assistant. Graduated from University of Michigan.

Author's Posts

Arizona News

Senator McSally Introduces Bill to Help Lower Drug Prices

Sen. McSally has drawn fire since her race for Senate in 2018 in which she was challenged on her interest in protecting patients and consumers from industry costs. Since McSally's appointment early last year, the Senator has been looking out for...

National News

Kaiser Permanente Triples Income in a Single Year, Draws Scrutiny for Nonprofit Status

Kaiser Permanente (KPH), one of the largest non-profit health systems in the country, reported $7.5 billion dollars in income for the year 2019, roughly triple what they made in 2018. Despite the sudden and striking change in income, Kaiser appears to have a vested interest in boosting local communities where they are integrated and are...

National News

Study: SDOH Investment on the Rise for Health Systems

Social determinants of health (SDOHs) are the conditions that people exist within throughout their daily life, like their age, occupation, income, and the external forces that shape their daily lives. Studies have shown one of the best ways to administer preventative care is to improve conditions for communities and demographics that...

National News

Independent Practice Associations Suggested for Struggling SNFs

Medicare Advantage (MA) and the support it receives from the Trump Administration causes difficulties for nursing home owners and skilled nursing facilities by effecting lengths of stay and making it more difficult for small business or individual home care providers to function under traditional Medicare by skewing...

National News

Humana, Private Equity Firm Announce Plans for Senior Primary Care Centers

This week, health insurance company Humana, Inc. and private equity company Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe announced they will launch a $600 million project in primary care centers specifically for Medicare Advantage beneficiaries. Humana’s Partners in Primary Care already runs primary care facilities in a handful of markets...

Arizona News

Mayo Clinic, Top Ranked Hospitals Penalized under Hospital-Acquired Condition Reduction Program

Surprisingly, seven of the top ranked hospitals by the U.S. News and World Report are included in this year’s penalty list, including Phoenix’s top-ranked Mayo Clinic. Nearly 800 hospitals will be penalized under the Hospital-Acquired Condition Reduction Program (HAC), a Medicare pay-for-performance program by the Centers for...

Arizona News

AHR Senior Report: AZ Drops to 31st in Senior Health, Social Isolation a Factor

Arizona dropped 7 rankings between 2013 and 2019 in the United Health Foundation’s annual America’s Health Rankings Senior Report, with social seclusion cited by advocates as one of the biggest reasons for the change. With Arizona’s ever-rising senior population, and the national population of seniors expected to double by...

National News

JAMA: Factors in Post-Acute Care Recovery Impacted by Medicare Bundling

A study released this week found the rate of recovery and the length of a patient’s stay at a nursing facility are correlated with a patient’s mobility and their ability to care for themselves. This contributes evidence that Medicare’s bundled-payment program could negatively affect nursing homes and rehabilitation...

Arizona News

AHCCCS Partners with 3 Insurers to Tackle Home Caregiver Shortage

Arizona’s rising senior population spurred the state’s Medicaid program, the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS), to partner with three insurers to address the projected shortage for home caregivers. The insurers, Southwest Catholic Health Network Corp., Banner University Family Care and United Healthcare Community...

Arizona News

Prescott Valley Eye Surgeon Indicted by AG

On January 2nd, Prescott Valley eye surgeon Dr. Michael Lee Ham was arrested and charged with conspiracy, fraudulent schemes and artifices, illegal control of an enterprise, theft and money laundering violations for allegedly defrauding Medicare, the US Department of Veterans Affairs and the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System...

National News

Supreme Court Rejects Motion to Expedite ACA Case

On January 21, the Supreme Court denied a motion to expedite a case requesting a full repeal of the Affordable Care Act. The lawsuit, titled both California v. Texas and House of Representatives v. Texas, is an effort by the Texas plaintiffs to argue that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in its entirety should be repealed due to a provision...

Arizona News

Consumer Choices for Primary Care on the Rise

This week the American Journal of Managed Care published an article regarding the ways in which the healthcare market affects primary care physicians, and the diversity of ways in which people access primary care. The retail health consumer approach, influenced by the commodification of healthcare in the United States by health...

Arizona News

Mayo Clinic Releases Study On Internal Pay Equity

Last year, Mayo Clinic conducted a study of all staff physicians employed by the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, Arizona and Florida in clinical roles in order to assess the equity of pay in specific demographic categories. The study found that across campuses, the Mayo Clinic has an estimation of what pay equity should look like. A...

White Papers, E books, Reports and more

Population Health Management Programs Lower Number of Bed-Days for Children Enrolled in Medicaid, Study Finds

A study published in JAMA Network Open last month found children enrolled in Medicaid who live in communities with a population health management program could experience far fewer hospital admissions and bed-days in hospitals per year. The study sought to investigate a specific aspect of a shift in dependent health coverage across...

Arizona News

CMS Approves Utah Medicaid Work Requirements

Prior to the New Year, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) approved Medicaid expansion with a work requirement in Utah, the latest in a long line of states tying expansion to such a requirement. In 2018, Utah voters approved Medicaid expansion, but it was kept from full implementation by state lawmakers who argued that...

Arizona News

Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego Hires ASU Professor for Behavioral Health, Dementia Initiatives

Last June, Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego gave her first State of the City address and enumerated her goals for improving city public relations with an emphasis on health issues. Gallego's speech made a special reference to the need for first responders to have training on how to address the growing concern of dementia in the Phoenix...

Arizona News

South Carolina Approves Medicaid Work Requirements

Last Thursday, the Trump Administration approved a request by the state of South Carolina to impose Medicaid work requirements. Nearly two dozen states have sought to implement Medicaid work requirements, but programs in three states have been set aside by the courts and Arizona suspended its AHCCCS Works program as other state court...

National News

Health Spending Grows Faster in 2018, Household Spending Reaches $1 Trillion Milestone

This month, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released the National Health Care Spending Report In 2018. The report demonstrated that health spending in the United States grew faster in 2018 than it had in the two previous years. The Dec. 5 report is a compilation of National Health Expenditure data released...

Data Resources

AZ SNF Data: Reduced Medicare Reimbursements for 90 Arizona SNFS in VB Payment Program

Following an annual data report by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), 77% of skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) participating in the Value Based Purchasing program will receive reduced reimbursements from Medicare and only 23%, or 2,909 SNFs will see a bonus in FY 2020. Last year in Arizona, 138 SNFs participated...

White Papers, E books, Reports and more

Research Paper: The Conservative Answer to Medicare Reform & Medicare for All

The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science released the paper, “Economic Principles for Medicare Reform” to shed light on the “trade-offs that reform proposals should grapple with but often ignore” at an event at the American Enterprise Institute November 21. The article’s authors, Harvard...

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