Tag: care
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Can We Fix Alabama’s Rural Physician Shortage?
It takes up to 10 years to train a physician. That decade of training is just one contributing factor for the reason the United States is facing a serious shortage of physicians. Other factors include the growth and aging of the population and the impending retirements of older physicians. While medical schools have increased enrollment…
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E/M Code Changes: A Deeper Dive at What Could be Coming for 2021
This is the second in a series of articles reviewing notable changes in the 2019 Physician Fee Schedule Final Rule and provides a deeper discussion of the potential changes to the E/M Coding regime scheduled to take effect in 2021. For the original article, please see Evaluating and Managing the E/M Codes for 2019 and…
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HHS Seeks Comments on Easing Stark Law Burdens
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has requested public input on how the physician self-referral law, or Stark Law, may be interfering with care coordination. To help accelerate the transformation to a value-based system that includes care coordination, HHS has launched a Regulatory Sprint to Coordinated Care. The Regulatory Sprint is focused on identifying…
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Patients, Doctors Dissatisfied with Electronic Health Records
Electronic Health Records are intended to streamline and improve access to information — and have been shown to improve quality of care — but a new study shows they also leave both doctors and patients unsatisfied, even after full implementation. The study, by researchers at Lehigh University and the Lehigh Valley Health Network, surveyed physicians, mid-level providers and…
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Association’s New Task Force to Address Health Care Manpower Shortage
In response to a resolution passed by the House of Delegates during the 2018 Annual Meeting in Montgomery in April, the Board of Censors formed a new task force to develop and restore adequate health care manpower in all geographic areas in order to provide quality local health care for all Alabama citizens. The resolution, submitted…
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President Trump Signs VA Mission Act
UPDATE JUNE 6, 2018: President Trump signed the VA Mission Act designed to increase veterans’ access to timely and private health care. The new VA law aims to combine and expand existing community care programs during the next year with intentions to roll out one centralized community care program next May. Building off the positive…
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Demand for Non-Physician Providers Rose to Make Up for Physician Shortage
The Medical Group Management Association has released its 2018 MGMA DataDive Provider Compensation Survey revealing primary care physicians’ compensation rose by more than 10 percent over the past five years. This increase, which is nearly double that of specialty physicians’ compensation over the same period, is further evidence of the worsening primary care physician shortage…
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Physicians Spend More Than Half of Work Day on Electronic Health Records
Primary-care physicians spend more than half of their workday on electronic health records during and after clinic hours, a University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health and American Medical Association study has found. The study, published online in the Annals of Family Medicine, shows physicians spent 5.9 hours of an 11.4 hour work…
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Alabama Medicaid Seeks Public Comments
Alabama Medicaid is seeking public comment on an amendment to the Alabama Home and Community-Based Intellectual Disabilities Waiver. Medicaid Intellectual Disabilities Waiver Amendment | Comments Submitted by October 8, 2017 The Alabama Medicaid Agency is seeking public comment on its proposal to amend the Alabama Home and Community-Based Intellectual Disabilities Waiver (ID Waiver). The waiver…
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CMS Proposes 2018 Payment and Policy Updates for the Physician Fee Schedule
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services issued a proposed rule that would update Medicare payment and policies for doctors and other clinicians who treat Medicare patients in the calendar year 2018. The proposed rule is one of several Medicare payment rules for CY 2018 that reflect a broader strategy to relieve regulatory burdens for…