VitalOne Health Insurance Blog

On the eve of the historic House Congressional vote on the wobbly healthcare reform bill, President Obama managed one last pull at the AARP, but may not have saved its members from falling into the verbal mud pit in the long tug-of-war over the Affordable Healthcare for Americans Act. By his own admission, AARP CEO Barry Rand knows his 40 million members are still very much split down the middle in their support. This leaves the President wiping his brow while leaving Rand in the awkward position of posing for the photo-op while crossing his fingers behind his back. The near-finalized bill will hit the House floor on Saturday night for a vote.

“As members of the House gear up for this historic vote, they will hear from older Americans,” said Rand, in a prepared statement announcing the endorsement. Although Rand said this marks the first time the AARP has put its “full weight behind a comprehensive health care reform package,” he’s likely to find more raucous town hall style debates swarming around retirement homes after the vote and regardless of the outcome. That’s because by all accounts on Capitol Hill, the Senate and the House are miles apart on the road to reform. Somehow, some way, there’s got to be another lane built on the highway to accommodate both parties’ differences.

“It is not enough in our eyes just to say we endorse a particular piece of legislation and expect that all the dominos will fall into place as a result,” Sam Wilson, the chief AARP rep in South Dakota tells the Daily Republic today.

Right now, the ropes in this tug-of-war are wearing thin. Parties on both sides are gonna need gloves to avoid further rope burns. Whether or not the holy grail of health reform — the so-called Public Option — remains in the final bill is sitting squarely in the mud pit.

Kellogg’s was doing its part to keep kids healthy during the flu season or at least that’s what they led consumers to believe. A bright yellow label displayed over the cereal box said their Cocoa Krispies cereal were now offering immunity support. With the flu season in full swing parents were grabbing it off the grocery store shelves to help keep their kids healthy. It turns out the labeling may have been a trick.

Marion Nestle, author of Food Politics, said “The idea that eating Cocoa Krispies will keep a kid from getting swine flu, or from catching a cold, doesn’t make sense.”She points out that all nutrients bolster immunity, and not just the Cocoa Krispies. Marion sent a letter to the FDA about this, months ago.  Other skeptics are also convinced the cereal company was just trying to make additional revenue in the wake of the swine flu hysteria.

The cereal giants have agreed to pull the label.  But Kellogg’s, is still standing behind their claims and have plead not guilty.

You can’t believe everything you read no matter how good it sounds or how good it tastes for that matter.

Lenneice A. Drew is an experienced journalist currently focused on healthcare reform. She is working to help others achieve better lives by finding affordable health insurance alternatives and reporting stories related to the healthcare industry. She lives in Miami, Florida.

Health insurance providers, both public and private, are looking for ways to cut spending. One of their strategies is to deny claims for treatments they deem unnecessary. The effectiveness-testing studies receiving funding in Congress’ healthcare reform bill is a case in point. While that’s a laudable goal, what if your doctor recommends an unusual course treatment?

Experts recommend that you never tell your health insurance plan that you are receiving an “investigational” or “experimental treatment; or if you are enrolled in a clinical trial. These phrases are codewords that make insurers more likely to look closer and reject your claims. First off, health insurance plans will cover treatment your physician considers medically necessary. When it comes to insurance, you obviously shouldn’t lie (that could lead to cancellation of your policy, leaving you uninsured); but you also shouldn’t give more information than is specifically asked for.

You may even be wrong about the experimental status of the procedure. Some procedures aren’t typically used, but are proven medically effective nonetheless. In that case, health insurance plans should cover it. Check with your doctor, even if he or she used wording such as wanting to “experiment with a treatment”. Don’t let semantics cost you!

Continuing the use of technology that fueled his successful presidential campaign, President Barack Obama is now using Facebook and other social media sites to push the Democratic healthcare reform bill. By reaching the younger demographics most supportive of the public option where they congregate, Obama hopes to motivate them to call their representatives and express their support of reform. Generations X and Y live on the Internet, and are also the portion of the population most likely to be uninsured. Some of them might think that they’re healthy now and therefore invincible, but others realize the importance of having a health insurance plan at any age.

The House of Representatives will most likely be voting on healthcare reform this weekend, and representatives will no doubt be hearing from their constituents about it. Opponents of the Democrats’ reform are fired up, and the Obama administration’s goal is to light that fire under supporters who believe it’s the best way to provide affordable health insurance to the nation. They must hope that Obama’s millions of Facebook friends and Twitter followers keep up with their news feeds and become inspired to get involved in helping him enact part of the change he promised them. Their presence was sorely lacking for Democrats earlier this week, when Republicans won governor’s races in two states in off-year elections–largely fueled by anger over reform, and fears of people scared of losing their existing health insurance plans. We’ll see if Obama’s final push pays off.

Yes, you read that right. South Carolina Representative Joe “You Lie!” Wilson has proposed an amendment to the healthcare reform bill lumbering through Congress, which would require all congresspersons to enroll in the public option health insurance plan. He hasn’t switched sides and decided to vote for the Democrats’ bill; rather, his amendment is a stunt intended to point out what he sees as the failures of the public option.

Ironically, supporters of healthcare reform have pointed to the government-subsidized insurance enjoyed by senators and representatives as evidence that there should be a public option–if health insurance is good enough for our politicians, shouldn’t it be good enough for the rest of us? (In fact, although the federal government subsidizes their healthcare, it is actually administered by private insurers.) Wilson turns that strategy on its head, by saying that if a public option is suitable for average Americans, it should also be suitable for Washington D.C.

It’s quite unlikely the amendment will be ratified in the House. The current language simply allows Congress to sign up for the public option. Most Democrats probably won’t vote for this ‘poison pill’ provision; as they have admitted, most Americans would prefer to keep their existing health insurance. Republicans might vote for it as a lark, although they might refuse to dignify Nancy Pelosi’s bill with any type of ‘yes’ vote. Joe Wilson has 72 hours to get his own mandate into the bill, before it reaches the House floor.

It’s not that they don’t want you covered. They just don’t want one “option” shoved down their collective post office boxes.

Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), the venerable leader of the powerful Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, gave small business owners their chance at the mic. Apparently, they had a lot to say at the Harkin-hosted “Increasing Healthcare Costs Facing Small Business” forum. As you might imagine, all the usual debaters for low-cost insurance advocacy were there. Those lobbying for the — dare I write it, Republicans — “Public Option” — were also on the soap box.

Since small businesses have been among the most vulnerable victims of this long, cold economic downturn, health insurance (by virtue of its current cost-model that favors group rates) has gotten really expensive for these folks. The less people you have on payroll, the more you pay for coverage. The more people you have on payroll, the less you pay for coverage, but the more you pay in salaries and overhead. Roll the dice. Either way, small business owners are taking it on the chin.

“Get it off our backs,” small Iowa newspaper editor and publisher Art Cullen, told Senators, “If that means a public option, fine. If that means an insurance exchange of some sort, fine. But give us a way to get out from underneath this albatross. It’s become expected that small businesses will provide insurance, even if they can’t afford it. And we cannot afford it.” I gotta hand it to the Congressman. The audience was appropriate. Since everyone has a stake in affordable healthcare, ears were burning everywhere. But we’re still waiting for something — anything — to change the bleak outlook.

In spite of all the back-and-forth between hecklers and proponents of more affordable healthcare (and I’ll admit, after Wal-Mart kind of took over the small business niche’ years ago) a plethora of insurance plans are still around, alive, well and thriving. Small Businesss can get it done. Care at less cost can happen. It just takes some entrepreneurial spirit to change the debate. Unfortunately, Congress has never been known for their independent streak.

With all the concerns over seasonal flu and swine flu (H1N1) vaccinations and whether the vaccinations will be delivered in time…you may be wondering if there is anything you can do on your own to protect yourself from the pandemic. Here are some home remedies that could save you from being infected.

1. Wash your hands with soap in warm to hot water. The amount of infection that could be transferred to other parts of the body can be reduced. Alcohol-based hand cleaners are also effective.

2. Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs spread this way.

3. Try to avoid close contact with sick people. If you must have close contact with a sick person (for example, hold a sick infant), try to wear a facemask or N95 disposable respirator

4. Clean your nose.  Dip a cotton swab in warm salt water and clean out your nostrils. Right before bedtime is a great time to do this. The salty water will cleanse your nostrils and prevent anything that may have settled in your nose from germinating further.

5. Bring on the Vitamin C. Vitamin C supplements and eating lots of foods that are high in Vitamin C can give your immune system just the boost it needs to ward off the flu and other virus’ that may be lurking around.

Lenneice A. Drew is an experienced journalist currently focused on healthcare reform. She is working to help others achieve better lives by finding affordable health insurance alternatives and reporting stories related to the healthcare industry. She lives in Miami, Florida.

States have struggled with it. Hospitals pray their patients won’t fall over it. Software makers are grinning over it, like the Cheshire Cat.

The massive rock paperweight that keeps our medical records in an ever-growing stack is fossilizing. Fast. As a result, congress, President Obama and insurance providers are shaking hands, creating partnerships and evaluating vendors to send our medical records into the cloud. Poof! Just like that…Up, up and away goes the latest results of your cholesterol test to that great big server in the sky. Paperless healthcare is supposed to create lower healthcare quotes for consumers. But will it?

“We’ve proven that paperless documentation can save costs for one of the most documented segments in the healthcare industry,” says Gerry Stone, founder of Redoc, an electronic medical records software company that specializes in documentation for physical and occupational therapists. “Believe me, if it works for Physical and Occupational rehab, it will work for the rest of healthcare.”

Stone has a point. He built his software platform from scratch 14 years ago, when electronic medical records were but just a glint in Bill Gates’ eye. Since physical and occupational rehabilitation is usually prescribed by health insurance plans to those who injure themselves on the job, Workers Compensation claims (and in the case of post-65-year-olds, repeated Medicare reimbursements) require an average of one hour of a therapists’ time filling out forms after each session. Stone has managed to reduce the hand-driven process of jotting down billing codes and treatment notes down to mere minutes by designing a simple interface of drop-down and text boxes, key shortcuts and the like. That was w-a-y before big Goliaths like Siemens, SAS and open-source companies jumped into the tepid waters of paperless healthcare.

Now that the President has essentially mandated paperless medical practices, the Cloud is gonna get a lot more crowded now. But how soon is now? Depends on who you ask. Software companies are courting their respective Congress persons and the President is waiting for the sky to open up and accept the first pile of medical paperwork. So far, there doesn’t seem to be any protocols drafted to guide how the information is documented, where and how it’s shared and who backs it up and how often. By the time the paperweight gets lifted, the ACLU and other privacy advocates will have their say on how private medical information is managed.

And what about HIPPA (Healthcare Insurance Portability and Accountability Act)?  When the medical records pile shifts to the servers, we’ll probably have an even L-O-N-G-E-R paper form to read and sign at the pharmacy counter. Figures.

And just a few years ago, we were blaming traffic cameras, public surveillance systems and mall cops for our lack of privacy. Pretty soon, if Microsoft has its way, we’ll all be watching ourselves anyway.

I’m self-conscious enough without CNN reporting this morning that the empire in Redmond is working on a personal surveillance system called “SenseCam,” which will serve as your own personal voyeur — essentially recording everything that you see and do, every minute, of every hour, all day long. Imagine a huge media card inserted in your neck.

Do you remember when Google started developing Google Maps and people starting calling local police departments to tell them about strange cars from the future with UFO-like pods (which we all later found out, was the actual GPS mapping thing) on their roofs? Well, keep that iPhone in its holster on your way to work this morning…Microsoft Beta testers are actually walking around cities across America today with audio and video equipment strapped to their heads. Human droids.

Of course, today’s technology creates opportunities for moment-by-moment documentation. But does that mean we really should document the mundane? More importantly, what does that mean for the future of affordable healthcare when, say, your electronic diary goes viral in the cloud and your insurance carrier watches you smoking a cigarette? Do our health insurance quotes go up?

Mircosoft claims the benefits of the system outweigh the inherent risks to personal privacy. Archives of your blog, Facebook or Twitter feed — both in text and in pictures – would help you remember exactly what you ate on important occasions, the papers you were proud of and the outfits you wore. For sure, such a tool would be a helpful aid for people suffering the horrors of Alzheimer’s Disease or other memory-related ailments.

Come to think of it (pardon the obvious subject pun), I could use a device like this to help me remember my countless log-ins, my parking spot and on those extra crazy days, my name. Not sure my own personal risk (i.e. – I am very clumsy) or the embarrassment of snickering pedestrians is worth me  strapping on a bulbous helmet-cam and wiring harness, a-la Ghost Busters.

So how many Gigs does your brain have, anyway?

Blue Cross Blue Shield is one of the most famous health insurance plan providers. They offer a variety of options to consumers, and part of their opposition to healthcare reform is based on its potential to limit their ability to sell certain types of plans. So why are they only allowing their Florida employees to sign up for a high-deductible health insurance plan in 2010? They’re part of a growing trend of employers passing a larger percentage of healthcare costs to the consumer. These plans are tied to a tax-free Health Savings Account, to which the company will contribute a certain sum (individual employees can add more money to the HSA).

On the positive side, HSAs force people to give more thought to their spending; they could cut unnecessary costs, making healthcare reform more affordable. Unfortunately, many consumers aren’t knowledgeable enough to make informed decisions–they could forgo needed treatment to save money, eventually costing them more in both financial and wellness terms. BCBS is trying hybrid HSA health insurance plans, in which they offer either 10% or 20% co-insurance to lower the cost of annual physicals and other preventative care. In addition, the health insurance company covers basic screenings (e.g. colonoscopies, mammograms) that may otherwise be avoided.

HSAs can be very useful to younger people in good health; they often result in lower premiums, since you only pay for the care you need. However, they’re not for everybody. A PPO or an HMO could be a better option for you. While some employers are no longer allowing you to choose, there are still options on the open market. You should always talk to an insurance agent to see what’s best for you.