Above the Fold
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Winners of the NCI Health 2.0 Developer Challenge!
Health 2.0 is excited to announce the two winners of the Enabling Community Use of Data for Cancer Prevention and Control challenge, sponsored by the National Cancer Institute (NCI).
- Ozioma – uses local health data sets to inform media sources, enhancing the relevancy of health related news stories. View the solution
- GSAREH – uses geospatial research to inform users of cancer related information in their communities. View the solution
NCI sponsored this challenge to promote the sharing of cancer data between public health entities and communities. Teams were asked to create a web-based or mobile application using datasets from the National Cancer Institute and Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS). The solution needed to enable communities’ use of population data for cancer prevention and control.
The winners of this challenge won a trip to and a speaking role at the 2011 Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences in Koloa, Kauai this coming January.
Congratulations to Teams Oziomo and GSAREH!
To view the official press release, please follow the link to Health 2.0 announces winners of online developer challenge.
If you are interested in participating in a developer challenge please go to http://health2challenge.org and check out the five new challenges live on the site.
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Social Security as a model for the Affordable Care Act’s future
“Check Back in a Generation to See if the Health Law Withstands Challenge” suggests the New York Times in an insightful piece that ran earlier this week, which suggests Social Security as a useful comparison. Social Security was enacted in 1935 but benefits didn‚Äôt start until 1941. During that long lag conservatives tried hard to get rid of Social Security and it took 10 years or so before it was firmly entrenched. Now of course conservatives love Social Security and other big entitlement programs they previously railed against, with Medicare being Exhibit A.
Democrats and Republicans realize the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is most vulnerable over the next few years before it is fully in effect, which is why Democrats designed it to have at least some elements kick in soon and why Republicans are mounting such a furious attack on it now.
It seems to me that history is likely to be on the side of the Democrats. Repeal isn’t going to happen with Obama in office, and if Republicans are somehow successful in having the Supreme Court declare the individual mandate unconstitutional and shave off some of the Act’s edges, what exactly are they going to do then? Health plans are going to scream bloody murder if they don’t get a bunch of healthy new customers –which the mandate is designed to deliver– and I can’t believe Republicans are going to bring back medical underwriting, i.e., exclusion from coverage based on pre-existing conditions.
If Republicans are successful in breaking the back of PPACA, they’ll have handed themselves a poisoned chalice. They have no viable alternative to PPACA, and a collapse is likely to lead to nationalized health care within a few years as employers find health insurance unaffordable and health care costs continue to bankrupt the country.
David E. Williams is co-founder of MedPharma Partners LLC, strategy consultant in technology enabled health care services, pharma, biotech, and medical devices. Formerly with BCG and LEK. MBA (Harvard), BA (Wesleyan)
Social Security as a Model for the Affordable Care Act’s Future
By
“Check Back in a Generation to See if the Health Law Withstands Challenge” suggests the New York Times in an insightful piece that ran earlier this week, which suggests Social Security as a useful comparison. Social Security was enacted in 1935 but benefits didn’t start until 1941. During that long lag conservatives tried hard to get rid of Social Security and it took 10 years or so before it was firmly entrenched. Now of course conservatives love Social Security and other big entitlement programs they previously railed against, with Medicare being Exhibit A.
Democrats and Republicans realize the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is most vulnerable over the next few years before it is fully in effect, which is why Democrats designed it to have at least some elements kick in soon and why Republicans are mounting such a furious attack on it now.
It seems to me that history is likely to be on the side of the Democrats. Repeal isn’t going to happen with Obama in office, and if Republicans are somehow successful in having the Supreme Court declare the individual mandate unconstitutional and shave off some of the Act’s edges, what exactly are they going to do then? Health plans are going to scream bloody murder if they don’t get a bunch of healthy new customers –which the mandate is designed to deliver– and I can’t believe Republicans are going to bring back medical underwriting, i.e., exclusion from coverage based on pre-existing conditions.
If Republicans are successful in breaking the back of PPACA, they’ll have handed themselves a poisoned chalice. They have no viable alternative to PPACA, and a collapse is likely to lead to nationalized health care within a few years as employers find health insurance unaffordable and health care costs continue to bankrupt the country.
David E. Williams is co-founder of MedPharma Partners LLC, strategy consultant in technology enabled health care services, pharma, biotech, and medical devices. Formerly with BCG and LEK. MBA (Harvard), BA (Wesleyan)
Two Degrees of Freedom
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I don’t often write about commercial ventures here, but from time to time, one that has a broader public service mission emerges. Here’s the latest, recently announced.
A company called Two Degrees is marketing a new, nutrition bar.* That’s nothing special (although it does taste good**), but what is special that for every one they sell, they will produce and distribute — working with Partners in Health — a nutritional pack to a hungry child in the world. The nutritional packs themselves are manufactured locally, so the company is creating jobs in the areas being served. Here’s more information about those packs.
“Nutrition packs are revolutionary treatments for severe and chronic malnutrition. Known as Ready-to-Use Food (RUF), these nutrition packs have been endorsed by the World Health Organization and treat chronic and severely malnourished children with up to 95% success rates.
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Loser Pays
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Tort reform is a hot-button issue among physicians. It distorts the practice of medicine by compelling doctors to order tests, the lack of which, might be used against them. It makes each patient a potential enemy. It forces doctors to spend time in extensive documentation. It imposes extensive, often unnecessary, costs on the health system. And it received little attention in the new health reform law, other than being kicked down the road through a demonstration project, which will further delay the need for further action.
Well, Texas acted on tort reform back in 2003-2005, and the fruits of that reform have since become apparent. A WSJ editorial on December 15 , which I shall quote listed these benefits.
“This Texas upgrade would build on reforms in 2003 and 2005 that have vastly improved the legal climate in what has not coincidentally become the country’s best state for job creation. Texas rewrote everything from class-action certification to product liability. One success was rationalizing the asbestos-silica litigation scam. Another was an overhaul of medical malpractice laws, ending the practice of venue shopping for friendly judges and putting a $250,000 cap on noneconomic damages like pain and suffering.”
“Before the reform, Texas was a kind of holy place on the tort bar pilgrimage. Now it’s a Mecca for doctors, especially the emergency physicians, obstetricians and surgical specialists who elsewhere can face blue-sky malpractice premiums.
Between the Cracks
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Between the cracks is a frightening place to be.
During the course of trying to improve our family’s financial stability, my husband and I were blind-sided by one hidden detail: We’d face $10,000 in costs to continue my husband’s serious medical treatment because we found ourselves unexpectedly without coverage for 30 days.
This was money we simply did not have. We had been prepared to foot the full bill for good health insurance, but that wasn’t even an option, thanks to the circumstances of our career transitions and my husband’s health.
I was leaving my job of 10 years to begin a satisfying new position that came with excellent health care coverage. It was a beneficial move that would offset my husband’s impending loss of insurance as his employer downsized and prepared to go out of business. We knew the end result, but we didn’t know the timing. It just so happened that his coverage ended the same month that I began my new job, leaving a gap of one month before my new coverage would begin.
With this routine employment-benefits formality before us, we knew we’d have to purchase coverage. We had hoped to buy a Cadillac COBRA plan, given the circumstances that require very expensive care. But we learned that an out-of-business employer is not obligated to offer COBRA, and our plan to continue the same level of coverage at our expense was not available.
