Description: The panel offers a recap of the most recent initiatives being proposed for reform of the Medicare program. Items addressed include areas of actuarial concern, potential impacts on the insurance industry and responses initiated by the actuarial profession. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Volume 30, No. 1, Session 48

Description: The panel offers a summary of the Medicare Modernization Act signed into law in 2003, which implemented sweeping changes to the Medicare program. Topics include Medicare Advantage, the impact on Medicare Supplement, Part D, and the impact on retiree health plans. From Record of Society of Actuaries, Vol. 30, No. 3, Session 127

Description: Panelists discuss the current implications of the Medicare Modernization Act on employer provided and employer sponsored health plans. Topics include Part D, MAPDs [Medicare Advantage with Part D], attestations, plan options, federal subsidies and current experience. From the Record of the Society of Actuaries, Vol. 31, No. 2, Session 108

Description: There is a wide range of literature on aging and health care. We sample this literature and find it fits into the subcategories of theoretical aging, medical significance of aging, treatment of the elderly, and resource allocation to the elderly. Themes are that financial arrangements can cause inefficient and ineffective care and that care guidelines need to developed specifically for the elderly rather than extrapolating guidelines for younger patients.

Description: Summary and analysis of the diseases and conditions exhibited in the Medicare Advantage population

Description: Analysis of possible mathematical relationships between hospital quality and hospital billed or allowed charges or other measures, using quality data as defined by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services along with the Hospital Quality Alliance for their Hospital Quality Initiative.

Description: Essay suggesting to fix the tax code, reform healthcare regulations, open the industry to competition and reform malpractice litigation.

Description: This paper summarizes the legislative activity from 1969-72 with regards to social security. Topics include expansions in Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance [OASDI], establishment of social security trust funds, and changes in Medicare including extensions of benefits to disabled persons. From Transactions of Society of Actuaries 1973, Vol. 25, Pt. 1, No. 73.

Description: A proposal to reform current health care market, from a 'preferred payer' system, in which Medicare and Medicaid pay less than the true cost while others must then pay more, to a 'value for money' system. This would be achieved by requiring providers to bill all patients the same rate for the same services, with a standard bundling format to make all providers' rate differences transparent. Differences between billed charges and what Medicare pays would be made up by the Medicare patient, rather than subsidized by those outside of Medicare.

Description: June 2013 issue of the Social Insurance & Public Finance Section newsletter, In The Public Interest.