December 2006

The Tax Relief and  Health Care Act of 2006 contains provisions to improve health savings accounts (HSAs):

1.         HSA Funding Contributions: The Act allows rollover contributions from flexible spending accounts (FSAs) and health reimbursement arrangements (HRAs) into HSAs as long as the contributions are no more than the balance of those accounts as of

Assuming siganture by the President of the "Medicare Improvments and Extension Act of  2006"  , the following will be the major Medicare changes for the coming year. The complete text of the changes and Committee reports are avaialble on the link in the article posted here yesterday.

1.        2007 PHYSICIAN FEE SCHEDULE: The conversion

Henry Butler, M.D. asks what the PA  MCARE report means in laymen’s language. Although the surchaerges are decreasing, the unfunded liability is $2.33 and rising!  Physician migration from PA  appears to have remain unchanged during the program. PA desires to end the program and encourage privitization of the excess or second layer of covergage. Worthy

Pennsylvania allows health care facilities or health care providers to charge fees for the reproduction of medical records. Below is the exact text of the announcement in the

December 2, 2006 Pennsylvania Bulletin (Vol. 36, No. 48, pages 7345 and 7346) announcing the approved fees for 2007:

Under 42 Pa. C.S. § § 6152 and 6155

The Pennsylvania Commission on the Medical Care Availability and Reduction of Error Fund (MCARE Fund) was created in December of 2005 for the purpose of investigating methods to reduce the unfunded liability of the MCARE Fund and the phasing out of the MCARE Program. The MCARE Program was created by Act 13 of 2002 to replace