Most Popular Stories
- iStethoscope iPhone app goes viral, may invite FDA scrutiny of medical smartphone apps
- Insurers open retail stores to sell individual policies
- U.S. healthcare spending drops for first time ever
- Define m-health, but then let's move on to the issues that actually affect care
- Hospital to test medication text reminders for teenage transplant patients
- Cigna buys Vanbreda, expands international reach
- Leading health plan CEO paychecks
- 15 Free Healthcare Apps for the iPhone
- Aetna is best health plan, UnitedHealthcare is worst, hospital execs say
- Nurses' jobs at risk for allegedly posting patient info on Facebook
- UnitedHealthcare contracts stop making no-warning fee changes
- WI nurses fired over cell photos of X-ray
Featured Jobs
- Director of Sales for Fast Growing CA Start-up
BAM Labs, Inc. - San Jose, CA - Pharmacist opening
CompHealth - Metropolitan area, IA
Events
- Health Care Business Alliance (HCBA) 2010
October 1 — Nashville, TN - 2nd Annual Mobile Healthcare Industry Summit
September 21 - 22 — Radisson Blu, London - Need Help Achieving 'Meaningful Use'?
Sept 29 - Oct 2 - Northwestern Online Master of Science in Medical Informatics Program
Paid Research Reports
- Electronic health records: getting it right first time
- Cloud Computing Adoption In The APAC Life Sciences Industry
- Stakeholder Opinions: Ophthalmology - Leading brands under threat
- Genomics, Proteomics and Metabolomics in Diagnostics: Market landscape, innovative technologies and future outlook
- Healthcare Regulatory Update: The United Arab Emirates
- Point of Care Testing: Evaluating the return to evidence based medicine, novel technologies and the competitive landscape
Free Newsletter
FierceHealthPayer provides the latest news about the fast-changing and heavily regulated area of healthcare reimbursement. Join thousands of healthcare plan executives who get FierceHealthPayer via weekly email. Sign up today!
Top Tags
We never sell or give away your contact information. Our reader's trust comes first.
Medicare Advantage plans look strong now, but questions loom
Exactly how the Medicare Advantage (MA) landscape will shake out in post-health reform America is still a big unknown. A new report from the federal government's chief Medicare actuary, Richard Foster, suggests that MA plans will reduce benefit packages due to approximately $136 billion in reimbursement cuts, resulting in a massive 50 percent fall-off in enrollment by 2017, according to the New York Times. However, early indications from around the industry support the continued survival of Medicare Advantage plans despite the reimbursement cuts included in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, reports Bloomberg BusinessWeek.
Not only did Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, recently tell a House Appropriations subcommittee that Medicare beneficiaries should have "a robust array of choices," but key players in the MA market have started 2010 in a strong position.
Payment cuts won't stop Minneapolis based UnitedHealth Group Inc., from competing with the traditional fee-for-service Medicare program, said President/CEO Stephen Hemsley during a conference call last week to report the firm's first-quarter 2010 results. UnitedHealth added 215,000 new MA enrollees in first-quarter 2010 and 310,000 over the past 12 months (an 18 percent year-over-year gain).
Louisville, Ky.-based Humana Inc., posted similar gains, adding 273,400 members in first-quarter 2010 (a 19 percent gain) compared to first-quarter 2009. Since Dec. 31, 2009, the insurer has added 233,800 MA members, representing a 16 percent increase.
The key will be how well MA plans are able to rein in enrollee costs while providing better benefits. "We have said for some time now that our Medicare Advantage business must ultimately be able to perform better than fee-for-service Medicare on a comparable-benefits basis and with care quality considered," said Hemsley. "We believe we can achieve and sustain that standard in the majority of our local markets."
The PPACA payment cuts should be taken seriously, but the health reform law also offers MA plans some opportunities, noted Robert A. Berenson, a former Medicare official now at the Urban Institute research foundation in Washington, D.C. For example, in 2014, MA plans will be eligible for 5 percent bonus payments if they implement programs that improve enrollee health or care-delivery efficiency.
To learn more:
- read this New York Times article
- read this Bloomberg BusinessWeek article
- read this UnitedHealth press release
- read this transcript of the UnitedHealth earnings call
- read this Humana press release
- read this Wall Street Journal article
Related Articles:
Cigna will sell Humana's Medicare Advantage plans
Medicare Advantage plans don't save over traditional Medicare, report says
Related Stories
Comments
Post new comment
Home | Subscribe | Advertise | Mobile Edition | RSS | Privacy | Site MapTHE FIERCEMARKETS NETWORKFierceFinance | FierceFinanceIT | FierceComplianceIT | FierceHealthcare | FierceHealthFinance | FierceHealthIT | Hospital Impact | FierceMobileHealthcare | FierceHealthPayer | FiercePracticeManagement | FierceCIO | FierceCIO:TechWatch | FierceContentManagement | FierceMobileIT | FierceGovernmentIT | FierceBiotech | FierceBiotech Research | FiercePharma | FierceVaccines | FierceBiotechIT | FiercePharma Manufacturing | FierceMedicalDevices | FierceDrugDelivery | FierceIPTV | FierceOnlineVideo | FierceTelecom | FierceVoIP | FierceBroadbandWireless | FierceDeveloper | FierceMobileContent | FierceWireless | FierceWireless:Europe | FierceCable© 2010 FierceMarkets. All rights reserved. |