Health Insurance Blog

According to the article “Medicare Advantage Premiums Expected to Rise 25% Next Year” by Jane Zhang for The Wall Street Journal online, premiums that seniors pay for Medicare Advantage are increasing.  This is mostly because insurance companies are cancelling many plans that carry no premiums in response to new federal guidelines. 

Humana Health Insurance Inc is setting up networks for its Private Fee for Service insurance plans and consolidating them next year.  Humana will have 149 Private Fee for Service Plans, which is down from 173 in 2009.  Humana made other changes such as the special needs plans which targets sicker people enrolled. 

The number of Medicare Advantage plans will drop by approximately 40% in total.  This is according to an Avalere analysis of Medicare data.  Some consumers will see their plans change dramatically and others will see their plans simply go away.  It’s important they are prepared for what changes may impact them directly.

Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (BCBSA) has an awards program called Blueworks which is a collaboration between BCBSA and the Harvard Medical School Department of Health Care Policy according to the Blue Cross Blue Shield website in their Newsroom.

The Blueworks program is in its 5th year and last week they recognized 6 Blue Cross Blue Shield companies with a total of 7 Blueworks Awards for innovative approaches to improving the quality of health care for comsumers. 

Harvard researchers evaluate and choose BCBS companies’ health care programs for recognition based on their innovation, and potential for replication.  BCBSA president and CEO, Scott P. Serota says that the winning programs are great examples of the work Blue Cross Blue Shield companies are doing in the community to improve health care.  They are providing consumers with valuable information needed to help make educated health care decisions. 

In September, Humana Inc. released 7 new videos in their well known series “Stay Smart, Stay Healthy”, according to the Humana website. 

This series is designed to help those looking for Humana quotes and health care, better understand how health insurance works.  It also covers factors that go into the costs of health insurance.  The options for health insurance in America have become much more diverse over the years and so has Humana’s products.  Humana’s short and informative videos can be viewed by consumers to answer common questions. 

Continuous interest in these videos encouraged Humana to make more health care videos.  They now offer Spanish translations and they can easily be shared through email, bookmarking sites and social sites.  Videos are available at staysmartstayhealthy.com and You Tube where they have been ranked highly among educational content because of the fun and easy-to-understand format.  Humana continues to be dedicated to educating the public on their health care options.

According to the article “Texas Agency: Senate health care bill could cost Texans up to $20.4B” by Dave Michaels on dallasnews.com, residents who think they are already paying high Texas health insurance premiums and high taxes may be in for a surprise as the health care bill gets considered.

The Senate is considering a health care bill currently that would add about 2.5 million Texans to the state’s public health insurance plans.  This would cost Texas taxpayers up to $20.4 billion over the next 10 years in taxes.  This is according to an analysis of the legislation by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. 

Texas currently leads the nation in the number of uninsured according to the US Census Bureau figures.  Over 25% of Texas residents lack health insurance, which totals about 6 million people based on a 2 year average for 07-08.  Although this statistic is staggering, it is uncertain whether Texas can afford to assist insuring that many more people and it makes the Texas government very nervous to implement such a project.

According to the article “Texas Health Insurance Plans Help Residents of the Lone Star State During Natural Disasters” by Ronnie Hamilton on bestsyndication.com, when Hurricane Ike hit Texas last year everyone with injuries, even minor, were sent to the hospital for a mandatory check up. 

Residents were strongly encouraged to seek medical attention as soon as possible to ensure everyone was safe.  Those carrying individual health insurance in Texas were grateful they were covered.  The article states that Texas has one of the highest rates of uninsured residents and this is unfortunate especially in a national natural disaster like a hurricane. 

This is just one of many reasons to be properly covered, especially if you have children.  The Texas government offers plans that are affordable.  It is also Texas law that there be programs available free or very low cost for children whose parents are unable to provide it for them.  Know your options and be sure you are protected.

Beth Fouhy from the Associated Press wrote a very interesting article entitled “People playing the odds on health care over costs” found on google.com.  The article discusses a group of people unsupportive of President Obama’s ideal that everyone should be required to have individual health insurance coverage.

It’s not known exactly how many of the 50 million uninsured Americans forego insurance voluntarily, but research from the Kaiser Family Foundation shows that most of the uninsured are young, healthy adults, who are self employed or in low wage positions that do not offer health insurance and do not pay enough for employees to afford individual health insurance.

But it is known that some people in this group of uninsured do choose to not carry health insurance because they pay far less for health care than they would in monthly premiums.  Plus it’s possible insurance wouldn’t cover all of their medical needs even if they did pay the expensive premiums.  Under one of Congress’s proposed plans, people who opt out of carrying health insurance may have to pay a penalty.  It will be a balancing act for the people choosing to not carry health insurance if this plan does become law.

Assurant Health Insurance, a leader in individual medical, small group, and specialty health insurance products, announced earlier this month about two changes to their leadership team.  This is according to their Newsroom article “Assurant Health Announces Executive Promotions”. 

Steve Cain has been promoted to senior vice president-chief administrative and risk officer.  Jack Rogers has been promoted to senior vice president-strategic development and provider management.  Both of these men report to CEO Don Hamm. 

In Cain’s new role, he will oversee the company’s touch points, aligning claims, medical management, customer satisfaction, underwriting and risk management functions.  In Rogers’ new position he will combine his previous duties as senior VP-provider management with the strategic development and mergers and acquisition roles as well as examining the future of health care delivery going forward. 

Many people are confused by the difference between PPO health insurance and HMO health insurance.  A helpful article on insurance.com entitled “HMO vs PPO” in their FAQ section does a great job of explaining the differences.

With an HMO, which stands for health maintenance organization, members must choose a primary care doctor from a list of member doctors.  This doctor will foresee all of your general medical care and must refer you to specialists.  With PPO health insurance, which stands for preferred provider organization you can either choose a general practitioner or a specialist, without a referral which can save a lot of time.

HMO’s usually require you to see in-network doctors, whereas PPO’s do not.  But with PPO’s there often is incentive to stick with in-network doctors.  The main benefit of HMO’s compared to PPO’s is that there usually isn’t a deductible to meet and the co-payments are generally lower.  The best choice totally depends on your personal situation and your particular needs.  It’s important to take the time to evaluate each health insurance option before making a decision.

Humana Health Insurance’s website has useful health and wellness articles including one in particular entitled “Couch Potatoes - Here’s Food for Thought”.  This article is encouraging members to exercise for many different reasons. 

The article points out that being a “couch potato” can be deadly.  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say the underlying causes of deadly diseases can often be prevented by lifestyle changes.  The American Diabetes Association states that 300,000 deaths a year are because of obesity related illnesses.  Small changes in your lifestyle may extend your life.

In the article it discusses the high cost of living an unhealthy life with no exercise.  High blood pressure, obesity, high cholesterol, and diabetes are expensive to treat.  There are high costs associated with pills, tests, medical procedures and other high-tech services.  In many cases, the healthier you are, the lower your Humana quotes will be.  It’s encouraging to know that our health is mostly in our hands, but it takes dedication and consistency over time to see significant changes.

The Senate Finance Committee is coming close to figuring out a healthcare reform bill according to Maggie Guo’s article on The Ethiopian Review site.  Health care cooperatives are still on the table, which has the idea of building large groups so that the price of expensive medical costs are spread out among members to reduce costs for everyone.

But Consumer Watchdog says this will not necessarily lower health insurance quotes for consumers.  They say that in practice there has not been enough members for cooperatives to carry out their function and people with less medical risk often opt out of joining. 

For a cooperative to be effective, member enrollment would need to be near 500,000 consumers according to some estimates.  There have been attempts in Texas, Florida and Colorado without much success.  There is also the concern that if small states get together to create bigger groups, then health insurance companies may insist on a suspension of state regulations because of the different types of customers they would be serving.  This would in turn cause a whole new type of oversight and possibly a lack of proper regulation.