Medicaid expansion is not a good idea, and here’s why: It fails to improve the quality of care. Support for Medicaid expansion often looks like a new op-ed titled “Refusing to expand Medicaid is wrong call.” Although its author highlights the need to focus on the quality of care for specific individuals, he misses the...
President Joe Biden sweetened the deal for Medicaid expansion in Wyoming (and other states that have yet to expand it) with COVID-19 “stimulus” dollars. According to Wyoming lawmakers who have historically resisted expansion, that money “really changed some hearts and minds in the Legislature.” The Wyoming House has now passed an expansion bill, and the...
Some great news from our friends at Montana’s Frontier Institute! The Montana Legislature has passed a bill to permanently authorize Direct Primary Care (also called Direct Patient Care) in the state. Texas passed similar legislation several sessions ago, allowing doctors to contract with patients to provide regular medical care for a set monthly fee. It...
Texans like to know up front what they’re paying for goods and services. That’s especially true of their health care services—yet prices in hospitals, where we spent the largest portion of our health care dollars—can remain a mystery. But now, state Rep. Tom Oliverson, a medical doctor himself, has filed a bill that would require...
Cities across Texas are witnessing some of the country’s fastest growth. With this rapid change, it’s no wonder that Texas is becoming an innovation hub — with Austin dubbed the “new Silicon Valley.” Health care innovation is no exception. We’re seeing new business models rise (from Direct Primary Care practices to direct contract surgery marketplaces) hoping to...
The more you spend, the more you save. Heard that one before? That’s the tortured logic some are now using to convince Texas legislators to expand Medicaid coverage to healthy, able-bodied individuals. Sound fishy? You’re right. They point to a recent study that uses a lot of wishful thinking and dubious assumptions to suggest that spending...
Elections matter. They matter because they signal to policymakers the direction in which a community, state or nation wants to go. When it comes to Medicaid expansion and making our system of delivering care to the truly needy worse, the people of Texas have made their intentions very clear. By keeping Texas firmly in the...
Doctors know that the key to a cure is the right prescription, administered at the right time. When it comes to the Texas health care system, expanding Medicaid is the wrong prescription — and it couldn’t come at a worse time. What’s a more effective approach? Improving Medicaid, so that it better serves those it’s...
Direct Primary Care (DPC) is not really a new model for health care in Texas. Long before employer-based insurance (with the safety nets for the elderly and disabled, Medicare and Medicaid) became the standard, patients paid doctors for their care. There were no middlemen—only the patient and the physician, and they made the decisions. DPC...
Who is at the other end of the stethoscope? Sure, it may be your doctor who is listening intently. But who is making the decisions about your care? Is it you and your doctor, or do insurance functionaries have the real say? Anything that comes between the doctor and the patient is bad for health...
The Democratic Party that is defending the Affordable Care Act before the U.S. Supreme Court next month is the very same Democratic Party that is proposing even bigger changes to our health care system. Though former Vice President Joe Biden prevailed in his party’s presidential primary, he was the last remaining proponent of former President Barack Obama’s...
When Senate Democrats aren’t making thinly veiled criticisms of Judge Amy Coney Barrett‘s deeply held religious beliefs, their strategy to make Americans scared of the Supreme Court nominee is to focus on health care. Specifically, they argue Judge Barrett would be a deciding vote to declare the fatally flawed Affordable Care Act (ACA) unconstitutional—which, they say,...