Tag Archives: Senior Issues
CFC supports AB 713
AB 713 (Chu) ensures that residents of a Continuing Care Retirement Community (CCRC) have the ability to prompt a fair and adequate review of an involuntary transfer of care. Under current law, vital factors such as the resident’s mental or physical health do not have to be considered, rending the right to dispute virtually meaningless. Read More ›
SB 648: Regulating Residential Care Referral Agencies
As the least-regulated long-term care facilities, RCFEs are easy targets for greedy referral agencies seeking to dump seniors in under-supervised environments. Some 7,800 RCFEs operate in California now, with roughly 175,000 beds available, and their numbers are expected to grow as the ranks of the elderly swell. Read More ›
New Rules Aim To Protect Widowed Homeowners From Foreclosure
by Andrew Khouri, Los Angeles Times
The rules, which expand and clarify existing guidance from the agency, were long awaited by consumer groups that are pushing similar regulations in a pending California Senate bill. Read More ›
Perilous Quarters: Deaths, Serious Injuries Highlight Longstanding Concerns Over Staffing Ratios In Assisted-Living communities
by Paul Sisson, San Diego Union-Tribune
In California, assisted-living facilities and memory-care centers are not technically medical establishments. They are not required to employ medically trained experts. Read More ›
Election 2016: Big Pharma’s $70 Million Tops California Campaign Contributions
by Tracy Seipel, San Jose Mercury News
The money is piling up on behalf of campaigns for 17 statewide ballot measures — the most since March 2000. And when it comes to big backers, Big Pharma is far and away the towering force. Read More ›
Why More Widowed Homeowners Are Struggling To Prevent A Foreclosure
by Andrew Khouri, Los Angeles Times
The state Senate Judiciary Committee [voted] Tuesday on a bill designed to give surviving spouses, domestic partners and children the same protections borrowers have in the Homeowner Bill of Rights, including the right to sue to stop a foreclosure or for economic damages after one occurs. The bill, SB-1150 … would prevent servicers from moving forward with a foreclosure before requesting “reasonable” documentation of the borrower’s death and the identity of the survivor. Read More ›
Got A Health Care Grievance? There’s A Place To Complain
by Claudia Buck, Sacramento Bee
[MyPatientRights.org is] intended to provide an easy link to the state Department of Managed Health Care, which handles consumer complaints with the state’s 122 licensed health plans. … Last year, the help center received more than 102,000 requests for assistance. … Requests for help jumped by 60 percent compared with 2013, largely because of the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, according to the department. Read More ›
Abandoned Nursing Home Residents Live Months In Hospital, Waiting
by Anna Gorman, KQED
Nursing home residents are entitled to hearings under federal law to determine whether they should be readmitted after hospitalization. The state Department of Health Care Services holds the administrative hearings, but has said it is not responsible for enforcing the rulings. But the state Department of Public Health, which oversees nursing homes, neglects to enforce the rulings and sometimes disagrees with them, according to advocates and court documents. … And since many nursing home residents have publicly-funded insurance, it means taxpayers are on the hook for hospital stays long after the patients are ready for discharge. Read More ›
Taming Drug Prices By Pulling Back The Curtain Online
by Katie Thomas, New York Times
A few entrepreneurs say they are aiming to fundamentally change the way people buy drugs, bringing the industry into the digital age by disclosing the lowest prices for generic prescriptions to allow comparison-shopping. … Nearly 90 percent of the prescriptions dispensed in the United States are for generic drugs, according to IMS Health, a consulting firm. … The listed price for a 30-day supply of the generic version of Lipitor, for example, is $196 at Kmart, according to GoodRx, and $61 at Kroger. With a coupon obtained through GoodRx, the drug is about $12. Blink Health is offering Lipitor for $9.94. Read More ›
California Regulators Are Urged To Scrutinize Health Insurance Mega-Mergers
by Chad Terhune, Los Angeles Times
There’s a lot at stake for families and employers if the deals go through and leave three health insurers in control of nearly half of the U.S. commercial insurance market. … Much of the debate centers on whether insurers should be required to limit rate increases for a time, expand their provider networks and make other pledges to improve patient care in order to win regulatory approval at the state level. … Consumer advocates say they fear that existing problems over affordability and access to care will get worse as insurers consolidate market power. Read More ›
FBI Hits Nursing Home With Search Warrants
by Marjie Lundstrom, The Sacramento Bee
California’s largest nursing home owner is facing a new round of government scrutiny as the FBI served search warrants last week at his Riverside facility. … The latest investigations shine the spotlight again on [Shlomo] Rechnitz, a 44-year-old Los Angeles entrepreneur whose facilities have been the focus of multiple local, state and federal probes, along with stepped-up scrutiny by health officials. The Bee found that homes he owned for all of last year were tagged with nearly triple as many serious deficiencies per 1,000 beds as the statewide average in 2014. Read More ›
Consumers Can Check Medical Prices, Quality Scores On New State Website
by Chad Terhune, Los Angeles Times
California and 44 other states received a failing grade in an annual report card that measures how much access patients have to actual prices for medical care. The new online tool seeks to remedy that. … Consumers could use the website to check whether the price they were quoted for a routine lab test or procedure is out of line with the average cost in their community. Armed with that information, a patient could shop around or negotiate for a lower fee. … Researchers said the data also show a wide variation on the quality of care that patients receive from different providers.
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Out-Of-Network Costs Lurk Even At In-Network Hospitals
by Chad Terhune, Los Angeles Times
A recent report by Consumers Union found that nearly 1 in 4 Californians say they were charged out-of-network rates when they thought that a provider was in-network. Most of these people — more than 6 in 10 — assume that doctors at an in-network hospital are also in-network, yet that’s often not the case. Federal law doesn’t protect patients from surprise bills. The Affordable Care Act requires insurers to cover out-of-network emergency services at in-network rates, but it doesn’t stop doctors from balance billing. … As it stands today, the healthcare system has consumers over a barrel. Read More ›