The Obama administration has halted plans to implement the long-term care program in the 2010 health care law after determining that financing plans for it were not sufficient.

The Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) Act, a program championed by the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, has come under withering criticism from

A commonwealth fund supported studies reported some key findings:

1.         Physician practices in the United States spent $82,975.00 per physician per year interacting with payers compared with $22,205.00 in Canada.

·         If U.S. physicians had similar administrative costs to their Canadian counterparts, the total annual savings would be $27.6 billion dollars.

·         U.S.

Eligible professionals (EPs) must successfully e-prescribe for Medicare patients 10 times before June 30, 2011 using claims-based reporting to avoid the penalty in 2012. Earning the e-prescribing incentive for 2011 will not necessarily exempt an EP or group practice from the 1 percent penalty starting on January 1, 2012. For 2013, the 1.5 percent penalty is based

Seven GOP Senate Finance members wrote a letter to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and CMS Administrator Don Berwick suggesting that due to the outpouring of concern from the provider community — including key health care integrated systems such as the Mayo Clinic, Billings Clinic, Intermountain Healthcare and Cleveland Clinic — CMS officials should pull the

The Social Security Act requires CMS to provide annual estimates to the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) for both the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Conversion Factor (SCF) and the Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR). According to the letter just released by Jonathan Blum, Deputy Administrator and Director for CMS, the 2012 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Conversion Factor