Description: Discussion of the implications of the newly unveiled health care reform proposal by Senator Baucus. Key issues include abandonment of the CLASS Act, inclusion of LTC in cafeteria plans, funding and tax concerns, individual mandate, privacy concerns, play-or-pay employer mandate, impact on Medicare and Medicaid, and gridlock in the legislative finalization process.

Description: This paper proposes, for long-term care, a new funding model in which social insurance and private insurance will pay for the bulk of the costs, supplemented by personal payment. If these sources fail, public welfare will serve as a safety net.

Description: The always popular Medicaid Hot Topics session is back with discussions from an expert panel on the most riveting Medicaid topics of the year. These could include the following: • Medicaid Fiscal Accountability Proposed Regulations• Tennessee's Block Grant Proposal• ACA court battles: What are the potential impacts on Medicaid? • Pass-through payments are converting to directed payments: What is changing?• And more current topics of interest to Medicaid actuariesMedicaid is dynamic and it is difficult to stay current on all of the changes. This session provides insightful discussion into the major changes that impact actuaries and their companies or state clients.

Description: The article describes the sessions that the SIPF section sponsored - Paid Family Leave and Medicare and Medicaid Update. The Paid Family Leave session described what it is and what states it is currently in and how it is being implemented. The Medicare and Medicaid update gave the attendees the most up to date news about what is going on at the Federal level.

Description: On January 1, 2014, many states will be enrolling newly eligible parents and childless adults into the Medicaid program. This article compares the expansion population to the current Medicaid population.

Description: This paper discusses the quality of healthcare verses the price of healthcare and puruses individuals and doctors making decisions for their own healthcare costs and services.

Description: State Medicaid agencies have been implementing value-based payment (VBP) models for the last decade and are increasingly exploring advanced population-based payment (PBP) models that increase flexibility, predictability, and accountability for participating provider organizations. PBP models show promise in advancing Medicaid priorities, but are still in the early stages of development, and model design and implementation challenges remain. This article from the Center for Health Care Strategies explores the fundamentals of VBP and how PBP - a particular type of payment model - can help Medicaid agencies achieve goals related to care transformation and quality improvement, revenue stability, and controlling cost of care.

Description: A glossary of terms.

Description: The essay discusses the appropriate role of insurance companies, efficient and economical ways to care for chronic illnesses and having a maximum price society will pay to support the ongoing life of any one individual.

Description: This article discusses some of the most important considerations in implementing risk adjustment within a Medicaid Managed Care program. From Health Watch, January 2008, No. 57.