Soda warning label bill clears committee A California Medical Association-sponsored bill that would place safety warning labels on sodas and other sugary beverages sold in California has cleared California’s Senate Health Committee on a 5-2 vote. The first-in-the-nation legislation (SB 1000) was introduced by State Senator Bill Monning (D-Carmel) and would ensure that all Californians are aware of the critical scientific information linking sugary drink consumption to exploding rates of diabetes and obesity. The bill would place a simple warning on the front of all beverage containers with added sweeteners that have 75 or more calories per ... April 16, 2014 General Pediatrics, Public Health, State Legislation, Obesity 0 0 Comment Read More »
Anthem mistakenly lists almost 1,000 physicians as participating in individual/exchange network Anthem Blue Cross recently notified 965 physicians that they were erroneously listed as participating in the payor’s individual/exchange network. The April 9 notice states that affected physicians were “inadvertently” listed for “a certain period of time” during open enrollment. After receiving a number of complaints from physicians who believed they were listed inaccurately as participating in the Anthem Blue Cross individual/exchange network provider directory, the California Medical Association (CMA) contacted Anthem to discuss the matter. At that time, Anthem acknowledged the error and said that affected patients had already been ... April 16, 2014 General Covered California, Health Insurance Exchange, Anthem Blue Cross 0 0 Comment Read More »
Medicare Advantage plans to see a modest increase in payments The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced this week that Medicare Advantage plans would see a 0.4 percent boost in payment rates for 2015. This small payment boost is a change from CMS's February proposal that would have reduced Medicare Advantage plans payment rates by 1.9 percent. This announcement comes on the heels of new data that predicts falling Medicare costs due to healthier baby boomers aging into the system. Healthier beneficiaries in Medicare have led to a downward drop in risk adjustment for the program. CMS has also ... April 16, 2014 Medicare Medicare, Medicare Advantage, GPCI 0 0 Comment Read More »
CMA supports medical board efforts to address prescription opioid misuse In an effort to support the Medical Board of California’s current review and update of the board’s Guidelines for Prescribing Controlled Substances for Pain, the California Medical Association (CMA) Council on Scientific and Clinical Affairs recently completed an extensive review of existing opioid prescribing guidelines and has published a white paper that summarizes their findings, titled Prescribing Opioids: Care amid Controversy. The paper was produced by a panel of physician experts, who conducted a review of current literature, existing clinical guidelines and expert opinion in order to present an up-to-date, ... April 16, 2014 General Medical Board of California, Drug Prescribing 0 0 Comment Read More »
Labor unions announce opposition to MICRA lawsuit initiative This week, two major labor unions announced their strong opposition to the trial attorneys' anti-MICRA ballot initiative. The unions – AFSCME California PEOPLE, the statewide political and legislative arm of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO, representing 179,000 members across California, and the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (UAPD), AFSCME Local 206, the largest union representing working doctors in the nation – announced their opposition in a press release. Both groups said it was clear that the initiative served the interests of lawyers, not ... April 16, 2014 General MICRA 0 0 Comment Read More »
What does the ICD-10 delay mean for physicians? The ICD-10 compliance date will be delayed by at least one year, based on a provision in a federal law signed Tuesday that pushes the date to no sooner than October 1, 2015. It is unclear at this time how this unexpected delay will impact the health care industry, which has been feverishly working to prepare for the transition to the new code sets, previously scheduled for October 1, 2014. The International Classification of Disease tenth revision (ICD-10) is a system of coding created in 1992 as the successor to ... April 16, 2014 General ICD-10, Insurance/Reimbursement, Practice Management 0 0 Comment Read More »
Anthem accidentally overpays some physicians Anthem Blue Cross recently notified almost 8,500 practices of a claims pricing error that caused some physicians to be paid for services provided to individual/exchange patients at Anthem's higher Prudent Buyer PPO rates. In the April 9 notice to physicians, Anthem states it had been applying “discounted rates inconsistently” on claims for dates of service January 1 through March 31, 2014. According to the payor, the error was corrected effective for dates of service on or after April 1, 2014. While not mentioned in the notice, Anthem has advised the California ... April 16, 2014 General Covered California, Health Insurance Exchange, Anthem Blue Cross 0 0 Comment Read More »
Local Group Announces Plans for a New Non-Profit Medical School A local group led by Dr. Dev GnanaDev, a longtime surgeon and nationally recognized leader in health care, announced Monday it has formulated a plan to develop a privately-funded, non-profit medical school in Colton, Southern California. The allopathic (M.D.) school, known as California University of Science and Medicine (Cal Med), College of Medicine, seeks to receive accreditation from the Licensing Committee on Medical Education in time to welcome its first class in 2016. “This is an exciting and much-needed opportunity for medical students in the Inland Empire and California,” ... April 16, 2014 General Cal Med, California University of Science and Medicine, Medical School 0 0 Comment Read More »
IMQ Introduces New Judicial Review Service & Professionalism Course Professionalism Courses for Physicians and Pharmacists Coming in May The IMQ Professionalism Program for Physicians and Professionalism Program for Pharmacists have both been scheduled for May 17-18 at the DoubleTree Hotel LAX-El Segundo in Los Angeles. These programs address both the legal and ethical dimensions of the practice of medicine in California, and introduce participants to a range of resources to address present or future problems. Both courses consist of pre-course assessments, the two-day ethics course, and a series of longitudinal assessments to track participants’ progress. ... April 14, 2014 General judicial review service, professionalism course , Institute for Medical Quality (IMQ) 0 0 Comment Read More »
CMS to publicly release Medicare physician payment data The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced yesterday that it would soon begin publishing individual Medicare physician billing data, despite objections from the American Medical Association (AMA) and other provider groups. CMS intends to publicly post the data as early as April 9. The release will cover some $77 billion worth of Medicare Part B payments made to physicians in 2012 and will include physicians’ provider IDs, their charges, their patient volumes and what they received in reimbursements from Medicare. Individual patient level data will not be released. ... April 9, 2014 Medicare CMS, Medicare, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services 0 0 Comment Read More »
